


Left of the Sun, Right of the Moon

by tiffthom



Category: Bleach
Genre: Adultery, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Awkward Flirting, Awkward Romance, Coffee Shops, Doomed Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Romance, Smut
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-20
Updated: 2018-04-22
Packaged: 2019-04-25 06:55:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 38
Words: 21,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14373327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tiffthom/pseuds/tiffthom
Summary: Collection of drabbles featuring Bleach's Ichigo Kurosaki and Rukia Kuchiki—my ship. The drabbles range from fluff, angst, smut, etc. I will try to post accurate warnings and notes before chapters so you can decide if it's your jam or not. I had these posted before in a collection but took them down to put them all in one place. I hope this format is easier.





	1. He Won

**Author's Note:**

> Ichigo and Renji's rivalry was instantaneous, but now it's come to an end. The outcome is nothing of what Ichigo wanted. Based on the final chapter of Bleach. Canon divergent in that it is my belief that Ichigo loves Rukia and she loves him.

The first time he felt the burden of his fledgling _shinigami_ existence was after the clunky _Zabimaru_ ran through his left shoulder tearing flesh and crushing bone. It was the first time he felt the thrill of battle, and when he suddenly gained the upper hand on the redhead, it was the first time he understood the depths of his unpredictable power. And so their rivalry was born.

Even after becoming friends, they still enjoyed competing. But when Renji lowered his head to meet Rukia’s lips, Ichigo knew the rivalry was over. She was  _his_  wife now.

He had won.


	2. Playing Pretend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rukia is trying to adjust to her new life as a captain, wife, and mom, but it isn't very easy to forget orange spikes of hair, the sword as long as his back, or the way he saved so much more than her life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Based on the last chapter of Bleach. Rukia's married to Renji and wants to make their life together work, but it'll always be Ichigo.

Longer ebony locks fall in a waterfall of ink down her back, and Rukia can’t tell if she’s reinvented herself enough, if she’s discarded the shell of the honorary third daughter she was to an ex- _shinigami_  captain. Her act needs a little more work to become real. Renji has keen eyes now since wedded bliss wore off, and reminders of what  _he knew_  the minute  _Zabimaru_  chewed through the ball and socket of Ichigo’s shoulder have resurfaced. She can’t leave that house attached to that clinic. 

* * *

The burn of the  _Sōkyoku_  hadn’t singed her like Ichigo did. He smelled of summer air and oil and the reconstruction of the  _Seireitei_  reminded her of it daily. He belonged there but he returned home, and it took all of her strength not to despise him for it. The only choice had been made, and as the shock fell away, she branded herself a hypocrite. Hadn’t she decided the very same thing once and made his face blank with disappointment for a heartbeat of a second?

A magazine that used to come to the Kurosaki home had said that women could feel reborn with a new hairstyle, and Rukia felt the depth of her sins. Marrying Renji and having Ichika did not renew her. They were not blank slates that replaced the fairytale that she shared with a human boy burdened with destiny. Family life was just a thing that stopped her from focusing on the sun so much. The practice had become her habit when Ichigo and his co-rescuers disappeared into the  _Dangai_.

When she changed her hair to outrun something the first time, it took too much getting used to, and people mistook her for Hinamori. 

_What about letting it grow?_

And it grew like the effectiveness of her façade. She and Renji became goofy lovers, the darlings of the  _Gotei_  and the focal point of the  _Seireitei Bulletin._  Shinigami gushed over Rangiku’s write-up about the lightheaded new wife who couldn’t be called by her husband’s last name because she loved him so much.

_“Oh!” Rukia grabbed her face the way she did when she lied to Ichigo’s classmates back then. She was a better actress in those days. “It’s so embarrassing! When I think about being Abarai Rukia, I just get flustered. I can hardly do my job.”_

Renji had challenged her the third time he noticed her tense up and huff ‘Kuchiki’ when someone said  _Abarai_. That was the curtain-close to their honeymoon.

Rukia worked around the clock to settle because at night, Renji slung his arm over her and for three months she slept with her eyes open. Being with him felt like using her left hand when her right was occupied. She tried fighting with her sword in the wrong hand once and she’d almost been killed.

After sympathy for Renji wiggled into her heart, she put forth a true effort to make changes, and started growing her hair. He loved the change, and Ichika enjoyed twisting her fingers in daddy  _and_  mommy’s hair.

* * *

“What’s with the hair?” Ichigo says, turning his back to her after her dig about the empty clinic.

“You’re one to talk!” Rukia raises her voice unnecessarily, but her excitement is like water boiling in a tea kettle. It’s been ten fucking years.

Renji sighs, taking off upstairs with Ichika and Kazui. Orihime and the others are out back with Ishida who finally showed up after Chad won the fight.

“You little –” Ichigo’s next words are clipped by the sparkle in her eyes.

And Rukia feels what he sees. She’s alive again. Smiles curl their unsure lips and they stand there, willing time to freeze, knowing it won’t, but hoping against hope because it is what they have always done.

“Hey, Rukia,” He says at last.

“Yo.” She winks and they laugh. The weight of her hair is almost crippling now. 


	3. Just A Dream

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rukia can't distinguish dreams for reality. Is her marriage the dream? Her family the illusion? Or is it the way she can't stop loving the man who isn't her husband?

She speeds up so she can get away.

It seems cruel not to wait for them, but she needs a moment.

Her feet dangle along the side of the craggy mountain, jarred and maimed by the soft gaze of too many moons, much rain, and the turn of the earth.

His eyes burned low like a dying fire that day, and she swore that she wouldn’t peek.

A thousand possibilities wedged themselves in the space between them, and only the regrettable ones were hand-picked.

Her lips burned for his, but there was an audience, and why compound the suffering?

Her heart could have cracked open right there, and wasted confessions of everything she loved about him.

She chose to look. It was desperate. And it was foolish. It’s like her heart needed to break as many times as possible since  _time_  was running out. Soon, she would never feel anything that strong again.

He’s the only thing in her dreams, and it suffocates her home. The walls possess secrets, but the lie of “in time” sustains her.

One day,  _this life_  will fatten her withered soul.

Renji had suggested that they see new parts of the Living World, and it’s all he needed to say.

She and Ichigo had dried up the last bit of his patience.

She looks down, waiting for her husband and their daughter to reach the summit with her.

The cold air dips into her chest and redresses the old, jagged wounds that have come open.

“Hey, you two! Any day now!” she yells, and the grin she wears is real.

Her voice echoes and fades.

She wishes Ichigo would disappear.

Just like a dream.

As if they never knew each other. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Based on the final chapter of Bleach.


	4. Can You Count Them?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> All of Ichigo is in love with Rukia, Zangetsu too.

There is nothing in his gaze except accusations. None of the cockiness she pretends not to love, none of that unchanging will she respects. A ring rests on her finger and he didn’t put it there. He thinks of what to say, still trying to handle her like the queen that’s ruled his heart for so long he hardly recalls a time before her.

“Why?” It’s the only thing he can push out, and his voice cracks. He wishes the ice she’s put between them would instead.

Rukia makes him stand there in silence. The ability to face her gives way to his resolve not to shed tears. He won’t break even though his eyes sting and his hands are trembling.

_Something slips._

He presses a palm against the side of his head, and he turns. Warm eyes become endless voids with an acid jaune at their depths. His nails are black and she expects the grin that her brother described in the most words he’s ever uttered in her presence, but there’s a flat, disinterested line on Ichigo’s face and he doesn’t wear a mask. He cocks his head to the side, considering her for a moment. She has the nerve to look surprised.

“Ichigo can’t talk right now so tell me why.”

“Zan… getsu?”

“Yeah.” He’s calm, nothing like the ravenous thing she’s heard about.

“Where’s Ichigo?” she asks, slightly on guard.

“Broken. In too many pieces for me to count. Talk.”

“I want Ichigo back.”

That grin comes.

“Right. That’s why you’re standing here with that ring. You could have just stayed away, you know? You’re great at that.”

The final  _Getsuga Tenshō_  sapped Ichigo’s powers, but Zangetsu lingered in the corners of his soul, bound, but there, waiting for rebirth, waiting for her. She only came when death made its move on Ichigo. How consistent of her. Zangetsu sits at Ichigo’s desk and fiddles with a cup of pens and pencils. The noise is louder than it should be in Rukia’s ears.

“Nothing to say, huh?” He swivels around in her direction. “I suppose there’s nothing to be said. Your choice is clear.”

He stands and looks down at her, and she’s never felt smaller.

“Get out,” he bites. “Don’t even think about coming back. Tell that mangy mutt the same.”

Her feet feel bolted to the floor, and as with old habits that stubbornly cling to life, she makes her decision.

_“I’ll never be able to make up for the pain I’ve caused him.”_

_“I told you not to come! I’m resigned to my fate!”_

_“If killing me will lift your spirits even a little, I will gladly offer you my life.”_

It’s always been easier for her to run away than face  _it_. She finds her footing, and doesn’t bother hiding her tears.

“Goodbye, Ichigo.”

She rushes out of the window, and quickly disappears from his sight. Inside, Ichigo screams for her.

“Pipe down, King. We both know it’s better this way.”

Zangetsu feels their heart squeeze, and the smell of rain is in the air.


	5. The Thing I Can't Deny

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rukia is about to marry Renji, but she can't outrun the night outside of the Kurosaki clinic when she gave her soul to someone else.

Some things are undeniable. The way Ichigo looks at her, struggling with her decision, is desperate and questioning, and Rukia’s scraping for answers. She owes him a proper explanation but can’t find her footing so she glosses over their first kiss and every other moment that made them more than friends. Finally, she reminds him that they made their choices. He returned to the Living World with Yhwach’s threat clanging at his eardrums inciting fear like he’d never known. He wouldn’t risk her life so paradise slipped away from them like sands through an hourglass. It’s been three years.

She adjusts her veil, and sighs. What’s done is done. She couldn’t spend another day figuring out how to be with him so she moved on. She’d had her fill of regret and she wasn’t going to waste any more of her life hoping to turn back the hands of time.

She tells him that periodic visits to their respective worlds won’t work for her, and he wants to believe it like he tried to back then. He attempts to force the words out like vomit.

_“If you’ve already made up your mind. If that’s what you really want…”_

But Ichigo can’t lie to himself again. He can’t tell her to marry another man when one look at each other after so long is enough to realize that nothing has changed.

“Rukia, look at me,” he commands.

She closes her eyes behind the veil embroidered with strawberry flowers, and he comes closer.

_Why did we mess it up? We were friends. We had it all._

“Rukia,” he says again and she hates it. She hates the way he says her name now because she’s trying to figure out how to promise to love someone else.

He pushes the delicate fabric behind her head, and her lashes flutter before she opens her eyes. Hazy amber bores into her and all she feels is him. She’s kidding no one but herself.

“Ichigo,  _please_.”

She’s desperate to end it because every time they say goodbye, it hurts. There’s a knock at the door.

“Is everything alright?”

It’s Byakuya. She realizes she isn’t going to make it down the aisle. 


	6. Memories of Mom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ichika wanted her mother's face to light up around her and her father the way it did around Kazui's dad.

Hide and seek makes Ichika’s little heart flutter. Nothing is more frightening than the thought of losing her mommy. It’s her recurring nightmare, the monster under her bed, and what she wishes to never happen on birthdays. She struggles to explain it, but when she crashes into Rukia’s arms, it isn’t what she expects. She feels cold. There is sadness. It’s different with Uncle Byakuya. When she hugs him, he’s stiff at first, but then he softens. Mommy’s body jerks and her head is bowed like she’s hiding tears. Daddy’s almost too warm. His affection smothers her, but his hugs are like a perfect summer day.

When it’s time to visit the World of the Living, her mother transforms. She wears another face, and she sings and pulls out Ichika’s best dresses. Ichika says all the things she wants because  _Mommy will listen_  because  _Mommy is happy_.

Kazui never suggests a new game. It’s always hide and seek. Rukia encourages them to play it to sharpen their ability to sense  _reiatsu,_  so Ichika plays.

It’s mommy’s turn to hide and it feels like it’s been a long time since she started looking for her. Ichika begins to panic.  _Did mommy go to that place she always seems to be looking for?_  

The little girl runs, but loses her footing, and falls. It hurts. She pushes up from the ground, smooths out the wrinkles in her dress, and dusts herself off. Somehow, she lost a shoe. She turns around to look for it but all she sees is Kazui’s daddy. Unable to shoulder her anxiety anymore, she rushes to him, wrapping her arms around his leg and burying her face into it.

“Mommy’s gone! I can’t find her anywhere!” she cries.

Ichigo brushes her hair back with a strong hand before crouching down with her shoe. Her violet eyes sparkle just like Rukia’s, in that way he fell in love with when he was just a boy learning how to be a s _hinigami_.

“Let’s put this on first. Deal?” he asks, holding up her missing shoe.

Ichika sniffles and nods. She puts a hand on his shoulder for balance, and Ichigo slips on the shoe. He picks her up, and the tears start all over again.

“Don’t cry,” he comforts her. “Let’s go get Mommy. I’ll find her, I promise.”

The little girl feels stronger just from the confidence in Ichigo’s voice, and everything suddenly makes sense; the way Rukia’s face lights up when the doors of the  _senkaimon_  open, and he’s waiting, the way they bicker, but seem so happy, and the way the sadness returns when it’s time to leave.  _He_  is the place her mother looks for, and when they find Rukia sitting high in a tree, smiling down at them, Ichika knows it, and she wishes the moment could last forever.


	7. Quitting You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It only took two months to forge something so unbreakable. Not even harsh years and a world apart can scratch the surface.

She tucked her daughter in after recounting one of her many battles. It was their ritual every night. Bedtime stories of cute things didn’t rile her fiery redhead like most little girls. However, Ichika was not immune to the charms of Chappy the Rabbit and her beloved uncle’s  _Wakame_ Ambassador. Rukia couldn’t be more proud. Ichika’s eyes sparkled and darted around with fury as she watched her mother act out the release of  _Sode no Shirayuki_ ’s first dance.

“ _Tsukishiro_!” she shouted, almost jumping out of bed. “You got him, mama!” 

Rukia nodded and motioned for her to quiet down. Daddy was surely fast asleep now. Ichika snuggled under the covers, eyes heavy, excitement giving way to fatigue.

“Goodnight, my love,” Rukia said, leaving a quick kiss on her forehead.

Tiny hands found her face and she wanted to melt.

_She has your eyes, Rukia. She is you, crappy drawings and all. At least she has an excuse though._

“Mama, let’s go back to the World of the Living soon, ‘k?” Ichika asked with half-lidded eyes, jolting Rukia from her memories. “Kazui is so much fun! He’s weird, but I like him. And his daddy is super nice. I think this is my favorite pillow now.”

She watched her daughter cling to the pillow Ichigo gave her as they left for Soul Society. She and Renji barely made it inside of the Kurosaki household before her former lover reminded her that they were supposed to bring Ichika with them. He was excited and a bit nervous about meeting her daughter, though he hid behind his signature indifferent front that she would always see through.

Their reunion took her by force and all of her preparations were moot. She thought she could control herself, but in a room full of people, including her husband, Ichigo arrested her attention just like he always had.

She promised Ichika that they would visit soon, and hated herself for lying. It was true that her captain status meant it was unlikely that she would have a valid reason to go to the other world, but it was not like Kyōraku would deny her. They all owed Ichigo everything, but he was married now and so was she.

At some point, she needed to accept that. If she didn’t, they would meet again, and his warm eyes would goad her to carefully remove his clothing, torturing him with her light touch. He would do the same, only with the roughness that he knew she craved. 

Their worlds would fall apart, but she was tired of fighting. She spent the better part of her life on the offense, avoiding shattering into pieces under the weight of her shame and self-loathing, but he changed that. He changed everything. With him, she didn’t need to be unbreakable because he picked up every fragment with neither fear nor judgment, and put her back together again stronger and better. That was just his way. She longed to let down her defenses once more with him, but she couldn’t break. Her squad needed her. Her daughter needed her. Renji needed her to keep her promise to him and their family.  

Ichigo was relieved of the burdens he carried. A normal life was now his and he had a family of his own. She knew their story was over, but seeing him brought everything back. Seeing their children bond like they had so many years ago was a cruel joke, but she would work to accept it. She would be a captain, do battle, bleed him out, freeze him out. Whatever it took, she would quit him, and let him be happy.

“It’s enough,” she told herself. “It’s enough.”

Across time and space, Ichigo refreshed his glass with whiskey. The amber liquid matched his gaze. Shunning all hesitance, he downed it. No matter how many swigs he took to burn away her memory, she persisted, robbing him of sleep and peace.

“It’s not enough.”


	8. Nothing's Changed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Time nor marriages to other people nor parenthood—nothing has changed the bond Ichigo and Rukia share.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: an adulterous kiss.

Fight night was over. Chad won and no one was surprised. Renji left for Urahara’s shop to visit Jinta. The ex-moocher would never admit it, but he missed the not-so-young man he bonded with years ago. Besides, Ichika said it would be cool to meet everyone her daddy talked about so much. Renji knew better. She just wanted to score goodies to take back to the Soul Society. Tatsuki and Orihime bumped around upstairs talking and playing music like the old days. The demands of motherhood left little time for their girl talk.

The moon was full and inviting. He loved the way the evening breeze danced through her hair.

_God, she’s beautiful._

She curled a stubborn tendril behind her ear and sighed. It was a perfect day. He forced himself to stop gawking at her and took a seat in a lawn chair, grabbing a beer from the cooler on the way down. The hiss of the can opening startled her, jolting her out of nostalgia.

“Ichigo.” She released a long breath. “I’ve missed this.”

There was peace in simply being with her. Nothing said. No one to fight. The threat of death long gone. But this peace was fleeting. Soon, she would go back to the other world and separation, the unrelenting nuisance that afflicted them, would be reality once again.

“Rukia.”

He just wanted to say her name. He wanted to release everything that kept him awake at night, everything that ensured his wife would never be enough, everything that he had waited on for a decade. He felt guilty, but he also didn’t care.

“I’ve missed  _you_. It’s been ten years.”

She nodded, walking towards him slowly. It had been ten years of finally having everything she used to want before he eclipsed her pragmatic thinking with his boyish innocence, unpredictability, his fortitude, bad attitude, his loyalty, and his love that would pass through even one hundred million blades. She grew up without a family. She wanted to prove her worth as a  _Shinigami_. Now, she had it all. Nobility, status, a family, and the greatest honor her career could bestow.

She still felt hollow. How could there be a moon without the sun?

The sky darkened as did his golden-brown eyes. He was so tired of longing for her. He wanted to possess her again like he had so many times during his stint as a substitute. They were breaths apart from each other. He nudged her with his knee.

“I’ve missed you too,” she confessed. “I hate how different everything is.”

“Not everything.”

She knew what he meant. She felt it too. Time ticked by at unimaginable speed but nothing about them suffered. He still needed her as much as she needed him. He reached for her hand. She accepted and came down onto his lap. Their eyes always revealed what was buried in their hearts. She could feel his longing and his frustration. He was fumbling through family life as well. They had everything according to their relatives, friends, and coworkers, but it was superficial. It was all safe choices and living just outside of the edge of happiness to avoid despair.

She cursed herself for getting caught up like this. Hours were spent coaching herself on how to behave around him after her installation ceremony, but that old rhythm of theirs pulled her back in after barely passing underneath the Kurosaki threshold. Renji was quiet even after the fight started. He was probably trying to convince himself not to worry about her and Ichigo being so dangerously close to each other on the couch. She didn’t want to hurt her husband. He deserved more but each night, lying next to him, despite how much she adored him, she remembered when he tried to kill her because he was too cowardly to stand up for her. Not Ichigo though. He took on life and death for her.

She pressed her forehead against her former lover’s, and closed her eyes. They were over and this was inappropriate. She needed to accept that once and for all. She shifted to get up but he grounded her with his strong hands.

“Rukia.”

Every time that he called her name, his power and his love coursed through her. He made her whole. He moved closer to capture her lips and despite everything that was proper and right, she returned his affection.

A little boy peeking through a window wondered why his daddy was kissing the nice lady.


	9. Only A Fool Looks Back

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rukia is trying harder than Ichigo. Her brother once said, "Only a fool looks back."

Regret means looking in the mirror and not recognizing the person staring back. Ichigo hasn’t been able to see the man he thought he was for a long time and he counts the days. Old habits don’t go away quietly. The years are heavy in his features. Heavier than all the battles that won him hollow victories and he can’t figure how it’s even possible.

Perhaps it’s not the years, but how he spends them. He lies to Orihime every morning she wakes him with her kisses and every night she finds rest against his chest. She likes the way his heartbeat sounds. It still amazes him; how different they are. She hears a lullaby and he hears a war drum hearkening back to halcyon days when Rukia stepped into his life injecting healthy doses of purpose and vigor for things he’d longed for but never knew how to articulate.

He is tired of lying, but he can’t stop because that means pretending that he only swore to save her because his parents raised a good boy. Some generic reason, not something tattooed on his soul. He wants to stop living in the past, but all of it blends together with Rukia; each way time manifests itself.

Orihime and Renji are outside watching the children fly kites. Inside the house, Ichigo grips the edge of the kitchen countertop as he strains to keep his voice down. Rukia is adamant that they give their marriages their level best, and the pointless conversation taking place for the fifth – no, the sixth time – may have the power to finally snap what’s left of his composure like a twig.

It’s always  _‘sacrifice this or that’, ‘farewell for an undetermined time’_ , or  _‘the powers are gone so there’s no choice but to live through it’_ , and Ichigo wants to shove a fist through the wall because no one has done any of those things more than he has. He’s not asked for much until now.

“So that’s it? You’re just going to go back to Soul Society and hide out while I stay here?”

Staying  _here_  and  _there_  is what’s gotten them into this mess; the fact that neither of them were ever brave enough to just take what they wanted. Rukia’s very much of the mind of  _‘what’s done is done’_. It’s like trying to swallow a rock every time her daughter asks her if she loves daddy because it’s clear that something just isn’t quite right.

“At least until it –” She wants to believe it’s possible, that she can undo or lessen what they are.

“ _It_  isn’t going to happen, Rukia!  _Don’t you think I’ve fucking tried?”_

Rukia goes still and the kitchen is so silent he can hear the earth move, and he immediately regrets betraying his front that’s more than a decade old. Renji saunters in, killing the silence, and Ichigo turns his back on him and Rukia. Her lips split into a domesticated smile and her voice is syrupy like the time she turned in that performance to his dad and sisters so she could bum a place to stay. Renji can’t even see what’s right in front of him, but maybe he doesn’t want to see. Do either of them? Ichigo’s mind wanders a little, turning over too many wrong choices, until Rukia clears her throat.

 _“Ichigo!_  Yo!” Renji’s voice finishes calling him back to the present.

He faces them, and Renji’s thumb points backwards to the front door.

“We’re gonna head out. Leave it to this one not to forget that we have meetings in the morning. ’Good seeing you, man. We’ll be back soon.”

It’s a lie and he doesn’t even know it. Rukia has decided the next dance that all of them will do. Renji rubs his wife’s shoulders as he grins down at her, and she catches one of his hands with her own. Their fingers intertwine and they start to walk away, but Ichigo stays rooted to the floor.

Orihime and the children have returned from outside, and they say goodbye, and Rukia’s eyes cut to the side to find Ichigo wearing a searing look that melts all of her ice. Orihime and Kazui see them off when the  _Senkaimon_  opens, and the last thing Rukia does for Ichigo is craft an excuse for why he isn’t there.

“He said he’s not feeling too good. We’ll see him next time though.”

She regrets it the same as everything else.


	10. Locked

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ichigo Kurosaki has recovered Kūgo Ginjō's body from the Soul Society and buried it, but his thoughts linger on the life he's taken and the many battles he's fought. He's always wanted the power to protect many people, but along the way, it seems he loses more and more of himself. Though there is darkness roundabout, there is a light that reaches for Ichigo, and he welcomes it without fail.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NSFW. I received this prompt on Tumblr: 'It's 2 AM, why are you here?' and wrote a thing. I hope that you enjoy it, and thanks for reading and supporting.

_What am I supposed to do after we’ve done everything that we’ve done? Who is your replacement?_  
_“Jungle” - H.E.R._

Sleep is pointless. All Ichigo hears are what-ifs ringing in his ears. There is nothing except the stench of blood and dirt on his hands. Ginjō is dead and buried, and he believed laying him to rest would grant him some last-minute reprieve from the guilt crushing his heart. This isn’t why he wanted power again. Once, he’d lusted for Grand Fisher’s head, but seemingly endless battles had eroded that killer instinct. He struggles with reaping lives.

_“Ichigo, you are a fool. A total fool. You had to kill him. How many times are we going to do this?”_

He doesn’t dare close his eyes because he knows the face he’ll see. The hollow has returned as well. Instead, he rolls over and stares at the uneven paintjob on the wall. Life is ordinary again. As close to that as it can be, Ichigo supposes.

Tomorrow he’ll return to school and even after Aizen and the fullbringers, all his friends will be their usual selves. Who will he be, he wonders like always. A  _shinigami_? Just a substitute? A human? Perhaps a suppressed hollow that will one day take control and consume everything in its path? He holds up a hand, examines it, then presses it against his neck. The markings that appear when he transforms now are dark like the blacks of the hollow’s eyes. Is it only a matter of time before he falls away like Ginjō?

_“Ichigo… If you had become the substitute shinigami before I did, would our point of view be the opposite now? Would you have become like me?”_

It is not the feeling of being betrayed by Soul Society that concerns him. He simply doesn’t want to lose himself to the void inside that thirsts for his sanity.

Gentle taps at his window rattle him back to reality and away from the grief that’s certainly warping his soulscape now. It’s Rukia.  _When does she ever knock?_  His chest tightens and he pushes open the window to let her in. She lands softly on his bed, and he sits up.

“Yo,” she says, sporting a smirk.

He closes his eyes and allows a small smile to pull at his lips. And just like that, his soul begins to glow. He remembers the flames of the  _sōkyoku_ and the way they illuminated shades of bright purple, normally subdued by deep violet, in her eyes. He felt strong the day he rescued her, but that feeling has evaded him ever since, making him give chase to nothing but superficial boosts in power that always cost him more than he’s prepared to give.

“Yo yourself.” He ruffles his hair so that he’s halfway decent-looking. “It’s 2 a.m. Why are you here?”

Rukia doesn’t say anything at first because she hears the unrest that binds him. The fact that he isn’t freaking out over her unannounced visit is telling.

“I’ve come to check on you, Ichigo. After everything that happened –”

“I’m surprised. After the battle with Aizen, you didn’t come once.”

He doesn’t intend to sound bitter, but he’d sure appreciate an explanation. She hangs her head, and lets the truth pierce her.

“I wanted to. I just – I didn’t –”

“Forget it. You’re here now. I’m back to the way I was now.”

He doesn’t like seeing her struggle with what to say to him. It’s never been that way for them. The explanation he sees so plainly on her face is that it has been just as difficult for her to make sense of how fate separated them and resigned him to a normal life. Besides, he’d never forget her face when they parted. They looked at each other, yearning for another moment, but their prayers went unheard as she faded from his world to hers.

“I missed you every day,” Rukia confesses.

He reaches out to pull her close and she collapses against him. His face warms, and tears well in his eyes, but he blinks them away, pinning them down with heavy sighs.

“I know,” she says, rubbing his forearm.

Her presence reassures him, and it’s easy to believe he’ll remain the Ichigo that she trusts. Soul Society isn’t as confident in him as he learned from Ginjō. At least, it wasn’t, and he questions if things have really changed.

“Everyone is proud of you, Ichigo. You’ve handled everything so well.”

He huffs and searches for the truth in that.

“It’s going to be okay, you know?” She feels the need to put him at ease. “All of it.”

It isn’t necessary that she mentions the hollow. He understands. At any rate, having her locked in his arms quickly takes precedence over his clouded thoughts. He doesn’t want to think about the enemies he’s slain or losing his mind as he appreciates her scent. It’s delicate like  _hanashobu_ , optimal when cloaked in heat.

“How long will you stay?” he asks.

She sighs and shifts against his will, coming up to look at him. Her eyes falter and he braces himself for what he doesn’t want to hear.

“I’m a vice-captain now so –”

“So you’re leaving before morning, right?”

Her brows wrinkle and she resists the urge to smack him.

“This is the third time you’ve cut me off, Kurosaki Ichigo.”

Though her tone is menacing much like another Kuchiki’s, he shrugs and pulls her back to him. He leaves a quick kiss on her head that doesn’t deter her from moving to catch his eyes again.

“What are you going to do about it?” he teases.

She slides a finger across his jawline and bites her lip. Giving him no chance to anticipate her next move, she kisses him, and every single one of his doubts melt away, falling by the wayside of his anxiety and lack of confidence in what the future holds. He mirrors her longing and turns to push her back on the bed. A trail of desperate kisses planted from her chin to the valley between her breasts makes her arch against him, and he pulls the  _kosode_  of her uniform open more. Her fingers dive into his hair and her nails gently graze his scalp.

The hollow hums, absolutely satisfied with the King’s present state. Ichigo rolls his eyes and forces his attention back to the evidence of her pleasure. Impatient groans make her throat vibrate against his lips, and he can’t get over how much he’s missed this. He’d be lying if he said he didn’t count each day that he spent without her.

Rukia recalls their first and only time. It happened after she bet him ten dollars that he wouldn’t kiss her. She never got around to figuring out what made her so confident that day. She supposes it had been the very thing that urges her now. He’s her match, and time is unable to harm them the way it destroys other things. Eternity secures  them. He unties her  _obi_ , and parts from kissing her to remove her  _tabi_  and  _waraji_.

“Ichigo, you should transform,” she says with half-lidded eyes, already hypnotized by his touch.

The request dumbfounds him.

“What’s the difference?” He’s hung up on the strings of her sandals.

“I don’t know, but I want to.”

She’s excited, and it hits him that they’ve never been together like that. He reaches for the combat pass resting under a pillow and slams it to his chest. His human body falls onto her and he cannot help the laughter that rolls out of him. She’s trapped underneath dead weight, and he watches as she flails helplessly. If he took a picture, he’s sure she’d break all his fingers so he resists the itch to grab his cell phone.

“Ichigo, damn you! Get this thing off of me!”

 _This thing._  He laughs harder than he has in too long, but obeys. He lugs his body off the bed and Rukia rethinks her decision.

“It’s creepy, isn’t it?” He reads her mind.

“Whatever,” she huffs, removing her garments and tossing them over his body.

Ichigo stares at her and cracks up again. He soon follows suit and dumps his clothes atop hers. They stand there, taking each other in, and she’s a bit more toned than the last time they were together, but he wonders if it’d just been the  _gigai_. He caresses the dips in the muscles defining her abdomen and she shivers a little. A smile overwhelms his features before he takes her lips. She inches impatiently on her tiptoes for more of him and it’s delicious and familiar. He directs his mouth to her neck as she runs her hands through his hair, tugging like he’ll disappear if she lets go.

He thoughtfully nips at her neck and she eases. Her head cranes back, and the tears she’d imprisoned fall gently and stain her cheeks.

“Ichigo, I’ve missed you. I’ve missed you so much.”

He just nibbles her ear and hums his agreement. He turns and walks her backwards until the edge of the bed stops her. She lies down and his lips continue their exploration in a combination of quick pecks and mouthfuls of her suppler parts like her breasts and inner thighs. His tongue reaches the sweet heat of her and takes no time to excavate the pent-up longing she’ll never need to verbalize.

Ichigo prods further, adding a finger inside to help him. Rukia grinds and presses, pleading with him to stop teasing her. He can’t help it. The jerks of her body each time he flicks his tongue over her clit or grazes her lips give him so much satisfaction. It makes all the time they’ve spent apart seem like nothing more than a terrible dream. But nightmares often reoccur. He swats the reality of her impending departure away, and continues his work. She slides her feet along his flanks, and he stops.

“Ichigo –” she starts, blinking to understand what’s happening.

“Turn over.”

She does, still wondering what he has planned, but not for long as he rolls onto his back and pulls her over his mouth.

“Ah… I—Ichi… go.”

He smirks at her stammering, and continues lapping at her pleasure. He presses his tongue flat against her clit, dragging it up and down before slowly rolling it around. There’s a rise in the pit of her belly that goes higher with each movement of his tongue until she comes hard, shaking and twisting against his mouth as he goes on, only stopping when her shaking subsides. He gives her time, and only kisses her sticky folds and thighs while he waits. She’s leaning back with her arms stretched outside of him. After a few more moments, she releases the bedsheets and rises to look down at him. There’s a self-important glint in his eyes, and she exhales deeply to let go of the last lingering sensations of her orgasm.

She sucks in a breath and closes her eyes as she scoots back. Her eyes reopen when she moves to bring her mouth to his cock. He prepares himself. At least that’s what he believes he’s doing. Everything’s lost when she takes him into her mouth and grips his base, twisting her hand in sync with her head as she swirls and bobs around on him. His breaths are sharp, and he curses her abilities. He shouldn’t feel this explosive after nearly a year and a half of feeling nothing. He adjusts his breathing so that he won’t come too quickly, and instinctively, she sucks him slowly.

He closes his eyes to flourish and ride the waves of this ecstasy, and doesn’t think too much when her tongue leaves him. With weakly opened eyes, he watches as she guides him inside of her. When her depths swallow each inch of him, he wants to shatter, combust, and rise from the ashes for more, but not yet. She isn’t ready to climax again so neither is he. He stabilizes her hips with heavy hands as she rides him.

“Shit,” he murmurs.

Rukia slides her hands from her neck down to her breasts, rubbing her nipples to stiff peaks and Ichigo observes, hardly able to suppress his awe of her. She smiles and begins to pick up the pace. His right eye twitches and his grip on her tightens. All he registers are the sounds of her behind clapping against his legs and the scrunching noises of her wetness and his sweat.

“Ru…ki…a,” he calls her in fragments.

“Yes, Ichigo. Yes. I’m ready.”

She grows dizzy as another orgasm mounts and he gnashes his teeth, anticipating his own. Her cry is guttural, the perfect complement to the growl that breaks out of him. She collapses onto him and he doesn’t withdraw from her just yet. He’s still pulsing and twitching inside of her and she’s quivering against his chest. He pulls over the blanket to cover her and they sigh in unison.

“Shit,” he repeats.

“Your vocabulary has suffered greatly since I’ve been gone.”

He laughs and she jumps from the sensation. Moving up, she slides off of him and finds rest against him once more.

“Why do you do that?” he asks.

“What, fool?”

“Go.”

She brings a hand over his chest to prop her chin up to look at him.

“Why do you stay?”

It’s the hand they’ve been dealt. What were they thinking, falling for each other when life and death stand between them? Time passes as they remain wrapped in each other in silence. Ichigo smiles and his face is full of light. Rukia plays with one his ears, desiring to freeze this moment so he’s happy forever. She chastises herself for always leaving him and her heart feels heavy. He senses the change in her thoughts and pulls her hand away from his ear, shaking his head.

“It’s okay.  _All of it_.”

She smiles and gives him a quick kiss. Their questions from before remain unanswered, and they fall prey to fatigue and sweet dreams.


	11. Manifested Dreams of Midnight Things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An aching need comes in the middle of the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NSFW.

Rukia won’t last much longer. Her attempt to hold on is made useless by the ministrations of Ichigo’s fingers rubbing and kneading, and her eyes roll back. He’s behind her, driving himself into her deeper, reintroducing her to the madness that is the foundation of their reunions. She captures the bedsheets, and winces his name.

“Ichigo, please. I’m going to – I’m going to…”

He pulls out. She’s wide-eyed, and the glare that follows is vicious. Ichigo just smirks. He’s so fucking full of himself sometimes.

Before she rages, he flips her over and finds his place inside of her again. She’s slicker than oil, and her whimpers and moans are like a siren’s song. He’s ready to perish.

Her bottom lip turns purple and there’s a fog in her eyes. Yeah, he’s feeling himself a little bit. Seeing her undone is beautiful. She sucks in deep breaths, and shatters. Her body jerks as she tries to tighten her legs around him, but they’re slippery from the sweat running in rivulets down his back. She hooks one leg with the other at last, carving his shoulders with her nails.

“Ah! God!” she cries.

The rest is incoherent.


	12. The Connection We Share

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some bonds are unbreakable.

The moon is full and bright enough for him to make out opaque clouds hiding behind playful stars. She’s like the moon, he thinks; seraphic and endlessly changing form.

Sometimes, she’s a twitch in his hand when he recalls her decision to go back to her life in Soul Society. Other times, she’s a roar in his chest when it hits him that he’s the man in her heart.

But always, she is the wish he holds onto, the hope that their fates will collide, and silly terms like ‘ _human’_  and ‘ _substitute’_ won’t separate them.

“Rukia,” he starts, trying not to fumble the words that are electric on his tongue. “I’m glad you’re here.”

She leans against his arm, and they resume their stargazing.

“Me too.”

Casting off her unction to be a good  _shinigami_ , her wish is for the night to never see the light of day so she can remain here with him.


	13. Seventy Minus One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ichigo and Rukia have tried and tried, but this new position proves difficult.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NSFW.

There’s mountain air in her breath, and she melts in his mouth like snowflakes. Ichigo hates that he combusts sometimes, that he becomes full to overflow with desire for her. Rukia’s frostbitten veins usually don’t last against his Vesuvian ache and need, and she ends up a beautiful heap of limbs and dark, damp locks. 

He laps her hungrily as she sucks him, turning up his flames every time she blows against his length. She sparks with each drag of his tongue, and grows a little less cold every second that fritters by. They’ve had this position on repeat this week, determined to execute the ideal rhythm. Rukia pushes back, commanding his mouth to go deeper, and Ichigo is compliant as always. He knocks the remaining chill off, and she’s mush as she bucks, relieving him of her mouth. She’d intended to swallow him whole this time, but practice would have to make perfect another day. 


	14. Sensory Overload

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rukia adjusts to the Living World and Ichigo helps.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I struggled with this prompt until I just sat back and relaxed. And then I had way too much fun with it. This is one of those pieces where I’m like ‘Damn, I love you. This is the story I wanted to read’. Prompt: What happens if I do this? 800 words. No angst at all.

The human world is filled with peculiar things and Rukia is curious about them all, but her roommate isn’t keen on answering her various and sundry questions. Understandable. She only hurls about five at him every hour.

“And what happens if I do this?”

She’s seconds away from getting them both in serious trouble.

“Don’t pull that, you idiot!”

Ichigo grabs her itching hand, centimeters from the handle of the fire alarm, and shoves her into an empty classroom. School’s out and only the two of them and some athletes remain. Ichigo is exhausted, barely able to recall the last night he slept decently.

“Can you please stop touching  _everything_?”

He heaves a deep breath, and calms to register the feeling of it in his chest. His bags fall from his hands into an empty chair.

Damn, Rukia is weird.

What kind of place is Soul Society? How are  _shinigami_  not up on the times? Ichigo’s head throbs. He’s damn near drowning in her inquiries. There’s no room for his own. Rukia pops the top off a dry erase marker and sniffs the neon tip.

“Oh, that’s awful.” A grimace screws her face and she drops the offending object, letting it roll across the floor.

Ichigo pinches the bridge of his nose when the marker disappears underneath the old heating unit.

“What did I  _just_  say? Look, Rukia, people are going to wonder why you don’t know anything if you keep making it obvious. And by the way, could you stop dragging me around all the time? No one needs to know we associate with each other.”

Years of image-building are going up in flames courtesy of this girl.

“And why is that?” She snaps and folds her arms over her chest. “You don’t like me or something?”

A faint pink dusts Ichigo’s cheeks and the rumors resurface to the front of his mind.

_“Does Kurosaki like Kuchiki-san?”_

_“I heard they’re doing it.”_

Everything of late is ‘Ichigo and Rukia’ and it’s too much for him. He’s just 15. A 15-year-old that sees ghosts and fights monsters that used to be ghosts but now eat the ghosts that aren’t monsters.

The whole thing sounds like a manga that’s destined to suck.

“It’s hard to like someone who’s turned my life upside down and doesn’t seem to care.”

He wonders where that even came from and Rukia is thrown off balance.

“You think… I don’t care?”

Her voice is shallow and he detects some shakiness and he swears if she cries or something, he’s going to blow his allowance on that cucumber salad she’s obsessed with. All she can eat. Heat rises up the back of his neck when her shoulders sag and her arms fall weightless at her sides.

“I’m sorry.”

He’s stunned. Not by her apology but by how pretty she looks. Her eyes catch the light and she traps him in a purple plum gaze. He can’t dislike her.

She’s the one who saved his life and teaches him how to wield a sword. She assures him it isn’t her specialty but she looked like she was dancing the first time he saw her floating on air with her blade. Ichigo hunts his next words but they fail on his lips. Her soul pager chirps.

“Well,” he stretches his arms and sticks out his chest, “let’s go.”

Rukia gloves her hand and rips his soul from his body that falls in a heap to the floor. They hide it inside a closet and Ichigo opens a window. She’s much too quiet and he feels guilt he can’t understand.

“Come on.” She interrupts his disappointment in himself. “Let’s hurry so we can get you home in time for dinner.”

It’s the best she can do to let him know that she does care, that she stares into the confined darkness of his closet every night damning her lack of strength. If she had the skill to slay hollows as easily as she wiped sweat from her brows, they wouldn’t be here masquerading as new schoolmates. It’s all she can say to him because admitting that he’s changed how she looks at things and she likes the new view would be too much. Emotions are not to be shown.

“Yuzu’s making barbecue tonight, but I can’t stop thinking about that cucumber salad. ’You up for it?”

And her heartbeat skips when he reaches for her hand and she climbs onto his back. It’s the closest thing he can say to  _‘yeah, I like you’_.

“Well, we gotta hurry!” She dramatically points straight ahead. “That place closes soon.”

They leap out of the window and land on nothing but the footholds of his own power. Ichigo senses that it’s going to be another sleepless night, but he can’t seem to care.


	15. Borrowing, Not Stealing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The backstory of the toilet brush.

Kon stinks to high heaven and Rukia is starting to regret not keeping him in a jar or something. She can’t decide which is worse – the smell of garbage set deep in the fabric of his plush new form or the wail of his voice. He and Ichigo are going at it again. Round seven? She’s lost count.

At school, she eyes a long instrument labeled _‘toilet brush’_ tucked in the back of the supply closet. It’s sturdy with thick bristles. The perfect thing to solve the curious incident of her offended nostrils. Ichigo’s room is a shoebox so it sucks up every smell and she refuses to endure it any longer.

After class, she returns to the supply closet and nabs the toilet brush. A triumphant smile parts her lips. The room, at last, will smell like something other than the underbelly of a very wrong part of town.

Ichigo waits for Rukia outside, far away enough that no one can see them leaving together and close enough so that she doesn’t have to walk much. Without her powers, he worries for her safety, but he won’t tell her. She wears smugness too comfortably. Twenty minutes elapse and there is no sign of her. Ichigo huffs, praying there is enough dinner left by the time they trawl into the house. He searches for her, but she turns up nowhere and he wants to scream even though he should be used to it by now; the way she disappears to locations untold.

He’s lucky enough to have a hearty helping of curry waiting for him when he gets home, and he sneaks a little more up to his room after eating. Yuzu is starting to accept their father’s assessment that her brother is a growing boy and needs additional nutrients. Rukia is casually drawing at his desk. Wasting paper, he feels, but no one asked him. He creeps up behind her and cranes down, just above her right shoulder.

“Hey.”

She nearly flies out of the seat and he has to move quickly to avoid colliding with her.

“Don’t sneak up on me like that, you fool!”

“Don’t leave me waiting on you without a word! I was standing outside of school for almost a half hour!”

Rukia ignores him and snatches the plate from his hands. She scarfs down her meal and they settle into whatever the hell their situation is. Ichigo reaches for a specific manga, but her hands are faster. He yields, too tired to read anyway, and she steals off to the closet. He mutters curses under his breath and yanks his bedcovers over his head.

The next morning, the smell is even worse when Kon decides to bless them with his presence, and it pulls Ichigo from his rest. He grabs Kon by the foot and hurls him all over the room. Kon’s screams transform into messy, nausea-induced yelps, and Rukia slides open the closet door instructing Ichigo to abandon his barbaric and ineffective cleaning methods. It’s time to unleash her secret weapon. She props a hand on her hip and the looks on Kon and Ichigo’s faces aren’t what she’d envisioned. She grabs Kon, securing him underneath her foot and assaults him with the brush dipped in  _‘Cherry Blossom’_  whatever, and it’s as if layers of funk are peeled away in an instant.

Ichigo starts to sweat. He knows good and well that she isn’t cleaning Kon with  _the school’s toilet brush_ , but damn it – she is.

“Wait, wait, wait, wait!”

She’s doe-eyed and piercing him with that peculiar innocence that is actually charming sometimes, but this is not one of those times. Rukia casually confirms that it is indeed the school’s toilet brush, and segues into some deflection about how he’s too strict.

“I didn’t see you doing anything about the smell, Ichigo! I’ve had it! I refuse to dwell in a space that stinks!”

“Then get packing! Last time I checked you were bunking here free of charge.”

Kon finally collects himself and crawls up Ichigo’s blanket. Good. They’re focused on each other now, and he’s not at anyone’s mercy. They continue their back and forth and it dawns on Kon that Ichigo and Rukia do this far too often. Arguing with Ichigo is as easy to fall into as quicksand, but it’s different when he’s butting heads with Rukia. They disregard personal space and get so close to each other they could…

_“Hell no. You’re in love with her. You jackass!”_

The very thought of it sends Kon into a frenzy. He leaps from the bed and latches onto the back of Ichigo’s head, plunging his soft paws into Ichigo’s mouth.

“Stay away from her! She’s mine! You hear me, Ichigo?”

Ichigo rips Kon away from him and throws him onto the floor.

“Gah! Disgusting! You put your hands in my mouth! Where the fuck is that toilet brush?”

Rukia hands it over, her self-satisfied smirk finding life again. Ichigo stabs Kon in the back with his foot and nearly scrubs the seams off of him.

“You bastard! You’re going to be so clean, I swear.”

Rukia hums to herself as she pulls her unfinished drawing from the desk drawer. She won’t bother soliciting an apology from Ichigo for condemning her solution to their putrid problem.


	16. Failure's Not An Option

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now, that Rukia and Byakuya have the chance to truly bond as siblings, Rukia's at a loss. Luckily, Ichigo knows a few things about little sisters.

****Her brother’s lying in a hospital bed and all Rukia wants to do is thank him for saving her life and taking Gin Ichimaru’s blade before it had the chance to run her through and end her miserable life. She pours whatever the hell she’s made into the sink, making Ichigo jump out of his chair after slapping a book face down on the table.

_“Rukia, what the hell? What was wrong with it?”_

“I don’t know! Something’s just off. I’m not trying to  _keep Nii-sama_  in the hospital!”

They’ve been at it all day, tearing around  _Seireitei_  seeking advice and spices and prayers for crafting the perfect dish for a man that wears million dollar scarves.

_‘A fucking scarf. Really, Byakuya?’_

Ichigo doesn’t dare think this aloud.

Rukia hits the wall behind her and slides down to the floor, knees angling up to her chest. It’s been a very long day of nothing coming together, and she doesn’t want it to all be a dream. She knows her ears didn’t deceive her. Byakuya had apologized, and peeled back a layer of himself and his past, and her heart’s still beating haphazardly because it’s what she’s wanted for years.

Ichigo really can kill Byakuya for the way Rukia is twisting herself in knots to make him happy. He still doesn’t quite deserve to be her brother as far as Ichigo’s concerned, but there’s a sparkle in her eyes when she talks about the many possibilities of her newfound sibling bond.

“Have you ever just felt the crushing weight of failure, Ichigo?” Rukia pulls her bang behind an ear only for it to fall back into place. She sighs. “I mean, I know you nearly slaughtered a group of captain-class  _shinigami_  so you probably feel invincible, but have you ever…”

“Yes,” he says, cutting her off and joining her on the floor. She narrows her eyes at him before he continues. “I have. I tried my best not to feel anything for you, and guess what. I failed.”

She’s wide-eyed and he can hear her next breaths. His face is impossibly warm. He feels like a plum fool. Preparation becomes him and he squints, expecting one of her signature smacks, but instead, her head rests against him and her body relaxes. He opens one eye cautiously and she nuzzles into him a little more. Silent agreeance radiates from her. They’ve never needed many words.

“Hey, Rukia.” She hums an answer to him. “Try not to worry so much. I’m sure whatever you make will be great and Byakuya’s gonna love it. Big brothers love everything their little sisters make.”

She remembers dinner at the Kurosaki home and spying on them through windows because listening from upstairs wasn’t enough, and she can’t help but wonder if it will be like that with Byakuya one day. Ichigo believes it will and that is enough.


	17. In The Aftermath

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What happens after goodbye?

When the  _Senkaimon_  closes, Rukia welcomes an actual life. Her brother speaks, though his words are few. Renji picks up like no time has passed, inviting her out with his friends that want to be her friends now, and she’s Rukia again despite the last name, despite the overturned death sentence, despite inspiring a boy to destroy the Soul Society if it meant that she would live.   
  
It feels good, but there are empty spaces she notices at breakfast when Byakuya can’t grasp how a juice box is something good.   
  
The silence is deafening when Renji’s not interested in her recollections of manga. He shifts the focus to  _shinigami_  things and memories of the Academy that she doesn’t share.   
  
She’d trade robes for dresses in an instant, and is grateful to Orihime for pushing her to accept Uryū’s gift.   
  
She longs for that little closet and Kon’s screeching, and the way Keigo and Mizuiro treated her; like a princess without all the fanfare.   
  
This isn’t what she expected when the wind swept blades of grass across the hill, and they twisted behind him in a cyclone. Her savior was beautiful without meaning to be.   
  
The sun fell on him at just the right angle, illuminating the brief moment he betrayed that she’d hurt him with her decision to stay. But then he smiled and it was okay.   
  
It’s supposed to be okay.   
  
After months, it still isn’t.   
  
But she’s been dispatched to the Living World again because of how well she knows the substitute there, and her abilities. She can finally prove herself, but all she thinks of is the moment they’ll meet again.   
  
The color fades from her face when Kisuke tells them that Ichigo isn’t the same, that he’s battling a demon inside him. Byakuya had touched on it briefly, and it was the only time she’d seen his serenity disturbed. Even lying on the ground and bleeding, he maintained regality, but when he described dry bone covering Ichigo’s face and the light in one of his eyes turning to pitch, Byakuya was unsettled like a pebble sending ripples across a pond.   
  
She wonders when she’ll want to stop protecting him from that night when her blade passed through him.   
  
 _Sode no Shirayuki_  had screamed, almost overwhelmed by Ichigo’s  _reiatsu_  until it fit like a glove.   
  
After they defeat the hollow, he thanks her, asks her why she cares so much. She’d slipped up and told him he was in her heart, always letting her words run away from her in his presence.   
  
“You fool, look where you’re going before you kill us both.”   
  
“You can walk if you’re going to be like that!”   
  
She can say it’s because she owes him her life, or that it’s what a friend is supposed to do, but…   
  
 _“The truth is I’ve tried to move on, but no one is you.”_


	18. After War

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What happens after the war is won?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AU last arc Ichiruki.

It is hard to see through his lashes when he opens his eyes after his power hurled him from the air to the broken pieces of Yhwach’s would-be empire. But Rukia’s light compels Ichigo to rouse himself, to see that they have won. He drags his body up with his elbows while she moves as fast as  _shunpo_  will allow her to.

The blast separated them, but there is the chill of her  _bankai_  all around. Its ice had encapsulated his murky, heated energy, saving their surroundings from obliteration. Rukia arrives just before he becomes too wobbly, and he falls like a feather in her lap.

The  _kaidō_  stings, but he registers the life coming back to his bones, possessing a bit of her own strength, and he is reminded of a day not too long ago, a memory in the rain. Ichigo wonders what they will be now, one foolhardy rescue mission and many battles later, and his strength transforms to hope. He sees it in the depthless blue of her eyes.

“You are such a fool,” Rukia says to him and to herself. She can’t deny it – that she feels it too as familiar gray skies loom overhead. 


	19. Ocean Wound

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ichigo's powers are gone. He's saved many, but still feels short of his purpose. And Rukia isn't there. Even if she were, he can't see her.

When the power left his body, seeping from his balled fists, becoming one with everything around him, he felt the small traces of her go as well. Seventeen months ripped away as pages from a calendar confirmed it. She couldn’t find it within herself to cross worlds and see him. Ichigo laughs at this because fate and time and space are cruel. There is no power, but there are scars above the left of his ribcage and through the center of his chest, and the offenders are just ghosts and shadows.

She doesn’t have the decency to stay completely away. No, she haunts his dreams, her orders and sentiments ringing true in his ears when he jolts awake rubbing calloused fingers over that chest scar. His heat works overtime to stave off the shell of ice that wants to form there.

His friends watch him with pained eyes that want to rip him from the past so that his feet move forward into the future, but they remember what he did, how he ravaged the afterlife for her life, and they are silenced.

“Do you miss her?” Keigo has never been one for tact. He says what he feels and there are always consequences.

Ichigo doesn’t pause. He doesn’t put on a deep and pensive look like he always has. He just rattles off a lie and Keigo has nothing left to say. Maybe it will simply take more time.

Time is just a thief and an alarm that reminds him of too many battles, of this great power and purpose she made him privy to, and it’s just so hard to return to pop quizzes and textbooks.

He eyes his father at breakfast, acting human, acting like  _shinigami_  are just myths, and Ichigo burns hotter than he ever has. He only cools for Yuzu and Karin’s sake. He only calms down because she belongs there and he is consigned here… where he belongs, but it’s just not that simple anymore.

He stares off into blue skies with clouds bleached white and pure and he remembers thanking her on two occasions, and he wonders if he’ll have a third. He prays for a third still after more than a year.

Just more time. Maybe in more time, he will forget.

He doesn’t. Rukia is under his skin, a scar on his heart. Something that will never heal. 


	20. If I Knew Then...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ichigo is getting older and it's all a far cry from what he once knew.

It’s his birthday and the house is empty and all he hears are noises from outside and the warbling dialogue of some show on television. Oh yeah, and the microwave is still beeping. 

Orihime is at a conference in America sitting on a panel, judging confections. Ichigo is happy for her. She dedicated all of her youth to being a wife and mother, and birthdays are just another day anyway. 

He hates the way aging feels especially knowing that he could easily sever his body and soul and mess around like he’s 15 again. But he doesn’t. He just rakes back what’s left of his hair and laughs at himself, at the way his life turned out. Everyone is moving and he is standing still.

The world still moves at an alarming speed.

It’s been twenty years since he heard the roar of a hollow or witnessed the open and close of a  _Senkaimon_.  _I wonder if she’s still a captain?_ He talks to himself as he takes a cup of instant ramen out of the microwave. He eats it piping hot because he’s lost the feeling in his tongue.

A butterfly flutters in through the kitchen window all black and unannounced, but it isn’t a swallowtail. He only sees those in his dreams.

It’s noon and he has half a day left to call his birthday, but all he wants is to become one with the couch and sleep. Sleep, maybe even dream about the days he was a hero and they all depended on him.

Lord knows, no one needs him now.


	21. Important Things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes how little Rukia knows about the Living World is incredibly frustrating until Ichigo remembers he wouldn't change a hair on her head.

She never sweats the small things like squeezing from the end of the toothpaste, replacing rolls of toilet paper, and using shampoo sparingly. And Ichigo feels 15 again; hawking over bathroom essentials and showing Rukia the human way of doing things.

He catches himself when he gets frustrated. She came up shoeless on dirt roads and eventually lucked up with more privilege than she knew what to do with. She still balks at the idea of servants. Nothing’s beneath her except blades of grass, and even still, she can’t help but admire how beautiful they make the field around them.

They’re having a picnic and she’s gorgeous sprawled out on the blanket dropping grapes in her mouth.

“Hey, Rukia?” Ichigo hums.

She dangles one leg over the other and makes out shapes of animals in the clouds.

“You left the cap off the mouthwash again and I ended up spilling it everywhere.”

“So that’s why your hands smell like that?” She can’t help but laugh.

Juvenile snickers seep out from the hand she’s clamped over her mouth. Ichigo just shakes his head and closes his book to join her in cloudgazing.

“I know I drive you crazy when I do that stuff.” She sounds serious, almost apologetic. “I never made up for all I put you through back then. You must have gotten sick of me a thousand times.”

“Oh yeah, I was really sick of you. Do you think that flaming bird will ever forgive me?”

Rays of sun glide over her skin and Rukia remembers the burn of the Sōkyoku. She smiles, thinking she can’t be any more silly if she tried. The last thing Ichigo’s concerned with is how much care she gives to their toiletries.

It’s been a long day. She snuggles next to him and her breath tickles his neck. He falls in love with her a little bit more, failure to sweat the small things and all.


	22. Where They Left Off

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's as if Ichigo and Rukia are always saying goodbye.

Rukia Kuchiki never begged. Not when her stomach threatened to crawl out of her body for sustenance, not for her brother’s approval, and not even for her own life when she looked death in the face and it laughed at her tears.

The act just didn’t possess the dignity that she’d adopted from a hard life that made it easy to discard self-respect by the handful. That dignity had given her a battling spirit, nails that clawed up and through anything to create a name, a life, the foundation of a legacy – all for herself.

But a first time for everything was always there, and it was often because of him.

Rukia watched a shooting star blast down from heaven and disappear into the thick of night, and she begged Ichigo out of her heart, downright pleaded almost on her hands and knees because if she could manage that, she wouldn’t feel so guilty about her new last name and the glint of unconquerable loneliness in his eyes that persisted even as he stepped into the  _Senkaimon_  punctuating their final goodbye.


	23. Onward

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What if Ichigo stayed in the Soul Society?

With new things come the cut of nervousness and the relentless tickle of butterflies at the pit of the stomach. It is simpler for Rukia to embrace the menace of failure than the flurry of what-ifs clouding the moment.

“Kuchiki-taichou of the Thirteenth Division!”

“Present!”

“Kurosaki-taichou of the Eighth Division!”

“Yo.”

The butterflies flap and fold under the roll of laughter that Rukia holds back. Ichigo had insisted that her name precede his despite their command, and she told herself it was his saccharine chivalry making a guest appearance.  _No._ He only wanted the sweat from her brow to dry and for her hands to stop trembling. Ichigo didn’t look at her, but she noticed the tail end of his smile as they stood next to each other.

_“Thank you, Ichigo.”_

_“Hey, that’s my line.”_


	24. Feet Ready For Destiny

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Ichigo and Rukia's wedding day, but they've been ready for destiny since the beginning.

His heart beat like a drum as he waited. Everyone’s eyes stuck to him, and the blood from his head spiraled down to his feet. Why couldn’t they have eloped? He’d all but begged her and she refused every time, her agitation growing and his left cheek coming close to being the victim. Ichigo knew better than to lament wasted effort. Byakuya would no doubt find the concept of running away to get married tasteless and cowardly. Still, the fanfare of it all was a bit too much for Ichigo.

He looked out at the room immersed in white and dipped in gold. Yuzu sniffled and rested her head against Isshin for support. Karin rolled and narrowed her eyes at them. She still couldn’t believe a girl had been fool enough to decide to step out into eternity with her brother, but she inconspicuously cherished the reality of their growing family. Rukia had always been like a sister anyway.

Ichigo noticed his father wearing an unfamiliar, serious expression, and his memory traveled back to their conversation earlier. Isshin had apologized, acknowledging how easily Ichigo could not have ended up here, enclosed by friends and family on his wedding day.

_“I haven’t done what your mother would have wanted in a long time, son. I’m sorry.”_

Isshin pulled him in with both arms, and Ichigo’s eyes felt heavy. It hadn’t dawned on him until that moment that his father’s warmth and affection were a few things that his broken soul had longed for.

“Kurosaki, are you going to be alright?” Ishida whispered beside him, ripping him from his reflections.

“Yeah, Ichigo. You look like shit.” Renji added, leaning out of his place in line next to Ishida.

“Don’t faint.” Chad nudged him from the right.

Ichigo cut them exasperated glances as the audience rose to its feet. He’d zoned out and hadn’t heard the announcement that the bride was coming. Beads of sweat pooled at the nape of his neck and he rubbed his hands together. His lips felt dry and if asked to speak, he wondered if anything except dust would come out. His agitated scowl softened after a few fast words of self-encouragement, but he still felt like someone stood on his chest. Ishida, Renji, and Chad grinned. They’d all placed bets on his reaction to the bride.

Rukia was veiled by a translucent, gossamer fabric. It looked white to a quick eye, but Ichigo realized it was lilac. Byakuya led her down the aisle slowly, his eyes fixed on Ichigo. The latter remembered their rematch filed under ‘ancient history’, and the accomplishment he felt when he read Byakuya’s steps. The man had taught him that someone was always stronger, and it was a lesson that had been beaten into him many times later. His lips curled up confidently, and Byakuya permitted the faintest smile to smooth away the stony look on his face. Rukia held her brother’s hand like her life was attached to it, and he shook a little to loosen her up.

“Rukia, there is nothing to be nervous about.”

“Yes,  _Nii-sama_ ,” she managed.

Her eyes found Ichigo and she felt naked, reborn by his gaze. Her legs ached to run to him and her lips longed to say the words she’d held in her heart for too long. She turned to Byakuya and let him go, bowing to keep her tears subdued. When she rose, Ichigo was there, at her side like he’d been for years without any protest. It was just necessary like breathing. Their fingers entwined, and destiny embraced them yet again.


	25. Falling, Flying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: I bet you ten dollars you wont kiss me

These rooftop lunches have quickly become the best part of her day. If she must be confined to this rickety body in this fickle world with silly humans spilling their emotions and making themselves  _so_  burdensome, she prefers to spend her time up high with the sun overhead and white clouds, never assuming the same form twice, wisping across the sky.

The boys are loud, but that isn’t new. There is a calm to the setting that she’s long forgotten. Kaien-dono used to train her on days like this. She removes the plastic from the straw for her juice and stabs the hole in the carton just like Ichigo instructed one day. A chuckle rumbles out of her. He’s so much like Kaien. He even looks like him. Sometimes she thinks she’s occupied this  _gigai_  too long, and let her guard down in this world too much because when she’s with him, she feels things that go against how all of this is supposed to work.

“Ichigooooo, you’re so lame! You mean there isn’t one girl that you like? Man, we’re not saying you have to marry her!” Keigo insists.

They always talk about girls. Rukia sighs, thinking how they aren’t very different from the male  _shinigami_.

“Let it go already! You need to be more concerned about your grades. Girls don’t like idiots,” Ichigo says, offering a thump to his friend’s forehead.

He’s annoyed but Rukia senses more. Discomfort becomes him whenever his hard-up comrades press him about girls.

“I can’t believe I’m saying this,” Mizuiro starts. “But I agree with Asano this time. I’m starting to think you’re afraid of women.”

Rukia turns her full attention on them, watching wide-eyed as she sips her juice. Ichigo glances at her, then turns away after their eyes meet.

“I am not!” he protests, arms crossed and nose pointing up.

Mizuiro and Keigo, without saying anything, agree to drop it. The bell rings and they all head back to class.

After school, Ichigo and Rukia start on their way home, and her silence worries him. Usually, she inquires about something she finds peculiar in the World of the Living, asks what Yuzu’s making for dinner as if he knows, or tells him what he could have done better the last time they faced a hollow. 

She hasn’t said much since lunch, and it’s just another way that she’s a closed book to him. The mystery that enshrines her is offensive at times. Her secretiveness pricks him especially when he’s risking his life. As much as he wants to protect others, there is too little she’s told him about the  _shinigami_  existence that enables him to do that.

“Hey, Rukia. You’re awfully quiet. Is something wrong?”

“Not really. I’ve just been thinking that you’re a liar. You are afraid of women.”

He chokes on a breath and fumbles his words, and she thinks the pitiful display confirms the accusation.

“W-what are you babbling about? I’m not—”

“Prove it,” she cuts in, wanting to hear no more of his talk.

Her heart races and she’s in a daring mood. She used to have a lot of fire back then for an eventual ice wielder. However, it all got buried underneath her need to prove herself at the academy, and the ways of the nobility.

She doesn’t want to be a burden. She wants to set aside these foolish feelings, but it isn’t easy with him. He extracts so much from her without even knowing. His mind is open, and with him there is a freedom that fate hadn’t allowed her to experience for long.

Kaien died, and her hands, frozen by fear, had killed him. Her world lost its color, and she became the privileged rookie that killed a man. She went back to being the girl Abarai can’t look at, the sister Captain Kuchiki doesn’t love. Kaien left his heart with her, but she felt unfit to pick it up since her own had stopped beating.

Then one night, she botched the job and bequeathed her powers to this boy, Ichigo. Brilliant hues painted her world once more.

“You’re crazy!” Ichigo says.

He waves her off and resumes walking.

“You  _are_  scared! You’re like a child.”

He stops and turns to face her. God, she’s aggravating sometimes, but she shares the same sentiment about him.

“Why do you care anyway?” he asks.

“Why are you scared?”

“I’m not.”

“Prove it. I bet you ten dollars you won’t kiss me.”

The words fly out of her mouth before she can stop them, and she doesn’t want to look at him. She stands with her feet planted firmly though. She can’t charge him with being afraid and then backpedal. He doesn’t say anything and the quiet that fills the space between them drowns out the life that goes on outside of this sanctified bubble that’s trapped them. She waits for him, but the feeling that she’s overstepped arrests her. Perhaps he isn’t afraid at all, but simply has his reasons. It isn’t her place to harass him about the affairs of the heart.

“Hey! Forget it! I’m sorry for teasing you.”

Rukia moves past him, but he catches her right bicep. Time starts going haywire, and she knows something has shifted in the universe and thrown everything out of sync. She turns to him as he releases her arm, and her eyes drawn him in. The moon and the stars are in her gaze, and he admits to himself that it isn’t being a  _shinigami_  that he wants to figure out so much. It’s her. He rests a hand on her shoulder and another on her cheek, and she melts slowly.

Ichigo leans down, and pauses when he feels he’s gone far enough. He needs reassurance that she meant what she said. She rises on the tips of her toes out of instinct like she’s being nudged by something fateful and inexplicable, and he kisses her. She’s sweet and the moan she releases ignites a flame in his belly. Desiring to deepen the kiss, she comes up as much as she can, damning her height, and he moves down more to accommodate her.

Slender fingers tug at orange locks, and there’s no air anymore so he breaks away. Her chest rises and falls. It’s still hard to breathe and even harder to believe what has happened. Ichigo smirks and holds out an open hand.

“I believe you owe me ten dollars,” he reminds her.

She puts a couple of fingers to her lips, unable to hide her shock for a moment.  _Damn it all._  She fishes the money from her bag and slaps it into his hand.

“Let’s go,” she says. “If you miss dinner, I miss dinner.”

She walks ahead of him, and she can’t remember the last time she smiled like this.

He doesn’t catch up to her because he’s too busy chiding himself for wanting more.


	26. Our Old Vibe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Is that my shirt?

The fit is baggy, but she’s never taken a liking to tight clothing so it’ll do. Too many pieces of Yuzu’s wardrobe have become a part of her collection, and Rukia begins to think the spiky-headed ingrate may be right. Perhaps she does “suck at laying low.”

Rolling her eyes at the thought, she snatches the manga from his desk and retires to the closet to read, but the  _gigai_  fails her, and she’s off to sleep not even halfway through the first chapter.

Ichigo crashes into the room, dropping his book bag at the door and surveilling the area for a trace of the death goddess who’s commandeered his existence. He’s surprised by the disappointment that greets him instead.

“She isn’t here? Where has she run off to now?”

He pauses to ponder his concern. It’s her fault that he requires tutoring in the first place. He’ll be coming home late every day this week so it’s good that she’s missing. Not even a thousand years of sleep can make up for their late nights hunting monsters. Her  _shinigami_  shenanigans threatened to ruin his academic future so the least she could do was leave him alone with a few moments of peace.

He falls back onto the bed and rests his tired eyes. Just as he settles into sleep, there is a beep that makes him spring to action, waiting for her hand to meet his chest and sever his body from his soul.

Another beep sounds from the closet, he realizes, and he raps lightly at the door. There’s no answer so he says a fast prayer before carefully sliding the door open. Rukia is knocked out. He reaches for the pager next to her and finds only a series of messages from Urahara. No hollows.

It doesn’t seem right to wake her for the non-emergency. Her face is gentle and there’s an uncommon little curve to her lips.

“You know, shorty, you don’t look half bad sleeping like this.”

A beat catches in his chest. His words find him off guard and he quickly goes to shut the closet, but the sight of ‘NICE VIBE’ splayed across her chest stops him.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me! Is that my shirt?”

Rukia’s eyes open and it’s the ingrate with the scowl she dreamed about.


	27. Out of Hell and Back To Heaven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She's never thought very highly of herself, but she's always loved high places.

There were a few places that ensured she never had to face her problems head-on. Mistakes and regret burned at her core so she taught herself how to freeze, and fell in love with grasping at clouds with aching fingers that really preferred the stars. Sometimes she’d find refuge on strong tree branches and canopies of foliage shielded her from all that desired to hurt her. 

Back then, Rukia believed the _Gotei_ would lift her out of the murk and sludge of _Inuzuri_ , but she soon met Kaien Shiba, and her heart dipped a little lower into hell. She went down again into the belly of ever-fleeting life and pondered her next move while her feet gently rested atop a streetlight. 

He looked so much like Kaien. There was no escape. No way out except death, and she was glad that it was finally her own. She was raised up high on that hill, but the clouds still looked down on her, mocking her inability to live among the stars. Only damnation awaited as payment for her sins. 

She felt more lonely than she ever had, but the broken record remained, “I have no regrets. I’m resigned to my fate. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.” 

A star reached her that day. A surly black sun with this fixation on valuing her existence stood up high with her, and that had to be what the end of loneliness felt like. 


	28. Paint The Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Rukia's birthday and Ichigo's told her she can have whatever she wants.

The scent of acetone singes the insides of his nostrils, but it’s her birthday and he vowed she could have anything she wanted. Rukia flips the pages of a magazine absently as Ichigo grips her foot and toes with the pressure of butterfly kisses.

“It’s never going to come off like that, you fool! Rub harder. I won’t break,” she tells him.

He tightens his hand around her foot, covering it entirely, and smirks. There is no way he can take her seriously when all of him engulfs all of her. At that thought, Ichigo shakes his head. He’d do well never to forget that Rukia Kuchiki can handle it. She can handle him.

Their day had quickly gotten away from them from hours spent at the shopping mall, and an impromptu picnic, but he wouldn’t change a second. In all things, the way her lips curve up is his one, true goal.

He likes her this way. At her feet, the view is always nice.

Rukia moves, knocking the bottle over. The noisome liquid spills onto the rug, and Ichigo is quick to grab a towel.

“Fuck,” he curses.

She winces at the result of her clumsiness. She looks over the bed at him patting the floor, and she cannot figure out how she failed to notice that his shoulders are broader, and that the sun has kissed him with a tenderness unlike any summer they’ve spent together.

She pushes herself up to a sitting position and takes hold of his hand after he sets the bottle aside.

“Ichigo.”

Her voice is low and it teems with what he knows all too well, but never tires of.

“Come here,” she orders.

He leans closer and her forefinger slides down his neck, tracing the outline of one of his shoulders. She presses her lips to his and her voice rolls over his body.

“Let’s get in the shower.”

He only nods as she gets up to lead the way.


	29. Love Mark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He vowed to save her, and it was a promise he'd keep even at the cost of his own life.

The echo of a  _reiatsu_  she can’t forget makes the wind crack and pop and Rukia feels it all around her, from the crown of her head to the soles of her feet.

“Ichigo?”

But it can’t be. She saw him fall by the blade of her brother’s sword, and there should have only been seconds left in his little, human existence. Still, an image shakes in the distance, and though it’s approaching fast, she’s unable to believe her eyes. However, nothing in her can deny orange spikes and a boy at her feet who is a little older and undeniably stronger.

_The rumor is true. He really did storm Soul Society._

She eyes the bandages he’s wrapped in, and her throat constricts like a hangman’s noose. He’s hurt and only she is to blame. He brushes past her before she can utter the last syllable of his name, and he’s warm. His energy is fiery enough to knock the chill out of her. He has always been powerful, a little cocky and very reckless, and the reasons escape her still.

_Why won’t he resign himself to humanity?_

She takes a moment to say a prayer of thanks for his survival, but she doesn’t dare entertain the dance her heart does upon his arrival. He’s cheated death and chosen to waste that gift on her miserable life.

He comes to her side, hearing her thoughts in his head as clearly as his own, and he’s baffled. How can a girl so intelligent, the one who aided him in realizing his destiny one fated evening that didn’t turn out too well for a hollow, be so clueless?

None of it matters, really. He’ll tell her until she gets it, until she understands what she is to him, until its shut up in her bones; the truth that nothing and no one else can change his world.

“Rukia…”

He starts, but she’s lovely. He can’t look at her properly because he’ll get weak-kneed, and require a minute, and the imminent battle will just have to wait so he stands next to her and though there’s a volcano in his heart threatening to erupt, he composes himself. When he regains focus, he feels the weariness of her soul. She wants no one a part of her mess, but he’s in up to his amber eyes, and there isn’t a thing she can do about it.

“I’ve come to save you,” he manages finally.

When he turns to her, the wide-eyed expression on her face chokes him, and he swears he can no longer feel the beating in his chest. How can he be a hero when she’s looking at him like this? Her eyes crinkle and well with tears, and he’s back to that night when she forbade him to move and he couldn’t go after her.

_Smile. Please smile again._

“Why are you making that face?” Ichigo asks. “I came to rescue you so you should be happy.”

She’s in pain and it gnaws at his heart and  _god_ , he’s going to beat the shit out of her brother for all of this.

“I told you not to come,” Rukia says.

Her voice has none of the authority it did when she jutted the soul out of his body night after night to perform his role as her substitute. She barely speaks above a whisper, and his mind is made up all over again. He’s going to free her, not just from this white tower, but from everything telling her that she isn’t worth his all, the fullness of the power he’s acquired for her.

“You can get mad at me however you like later,” Ichigo promises.

_Later._

Later because he’s going to end this, and they’ll return to the Living World, and she will be happy again.

Absolute determination envelops him, and he’s so different, she thinks. Yet he’s unchanged in every way she adores. He’d never run, and she chides herself for even thinking that he would. That isn’t who he is in her heart.

_“My heart?”_

Yes. Somehow, this boy that she hasn’t been able to expel from her mind, even with her life on the line, has conquered her defenses, and imprinted his name on her heart.


	30. Death and the Dawn

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When the sun touches the moon, it's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen.

Morning light collides with her the way thunder claps. There is nothing he can do except drown in the moment’s majesty, appreciating it as much as he can, but never close to the level it deserves.

Rukia’s breathtaking and Ichigo’s powerless to tear his eyes away from her. He wouldn’t if he could since times like these are rare. Usually, there are only life-changing hellos or soul-wrenching goodbyes so he’s going to savor this. His only charge is to milk every drop of pleasure from the mere sight of her.

She stirs to consciousness, and with a few blinks, those eyes of hers, luxuriously violet and deep like the ocean’s depths, open, and he thinks that he can’t be any more  _unworthy._

“Fool,” she yawns. “What are you staring at?”

He turns his gaze towards the window, and points. The sun is rising higher, and it’s the second most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.


	31. What Weekends Are Made Of

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ichigo has been acting strangely each weekend, and this time, Rukia figures out why.  
> Work Text:

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AU.

Ichigo takes his orders calmly, no protest and nothing to add, and Rukia’s suspicious. It’s their usual song and dance now that their days off are out of sync, and she works during the weekend. 

Parenting a six-year-old teeming with vivacity, and constantly needing their attention leaves little time for housework so they’ve agreed to fit tasks in here and there so that the house is always clean and errands aren’t put off until the last minute. 

Normally when she goes over what needs to be done, Ichigo either smothers her with kisses, reminding her that  _he knows_ , or asks why her to-do lists never fail to be miles longer than his. However, today is different. As a matter of fact, things have been off the last few weeks.

“What’s going on with you, Ichigo?” she questions. “You’re not saying anything.”

“Aren’t you going to be late?” he asks, heading towards their bedroom door.

She doesn’t let up. Instead, she slides the door shut and waits, hands on her hips because she can do this all day. She’s the Captain of the Thirteenth Division and paid time off is a thing. It amazes him how this tiny woman has managed to command him successfully throughout the years. Her midnight glare could kill, and he wonders how he’s survived this long.

“Rukia, it’s nothing,” he insists. “I promise. Now have a good day. Haru and I will see you when you get home.”

She kisses him, suspicions still raring to escape her lips, but she figures if he is hiding something, it can’t be too bad so she relents.

“Alright. Don’t let him sleep too long.”

Ichigo nods and walks her out. Once he senses that her presence is at a distance, he slips into their son’s room, and Haru’s already up, wearing a silly grin. His eyes pop open and the steely grays still puzzle him.

_“You know, Haru looks like you and the captain had a child,” Renji still jokes._

Ichigo shudders and puts the memory away. Fortunately, his son possesses an excellent sense of adventure unlike his uncle.

“Hey, kid. You ready?” Ichigo takes his stance.

Haru jumps up and draws his weapon from its holster.

“Dad,” his tone is something out of a comicbook. “Prepare yourself!”

Nonlethal pellets shoot out one after the other, and Ichigo retreats. Haru’s aim has greatly improved since last weekend, and if Ichigo hadn’t managed to quickly get away to the living room, he might have taken a hit.

“Running? You coward!” Haru accuses.

Ichigo takes cover behind the couch, his son in hot pursuit. Maybe the eyes aren’t the only thing he shares with Byakuya.

“Found you!”

The boy jumps over the couch, with his blanket-cape flapping in tow, and lands on his father’s left. Ichigo is a goner. He loses Round One in an undisputed fatality. Haru’s bullets find their target six times over. Father topples over, “dying” dramatically and son’s villainous laughter fills the room. After a moment, Ichigo rises and bows to concede his defeat.

“Don’t cry, Dad,” Haru nods, patting Ichigo’s head.

The door clicks and in steps Rukia.

“How on earth did I forget my—”

Her next words don’t follow but are swallowed by the scene of the living room. There are pillows at her feet and she’s barely made it inside, knickknacks have fallen off the shelves, and two guilty men are to blame.

“ _What_  is the meaning of this?” she asks, her tone freezing them in place.

Every weekend, Ichigo and Haru destroy the house and scramble to undo the damage before Rukia comes home. It isn’t supposed to be this way. Ichigo sees the benefit in keeping Haru’s nose in the books and away from too many mind-numbing hours of cartoons and video games. He tried to keep the boy on course, but when Haru came into the kitchen one afternoon, guns blazing and wanting to play, there was no way his father could refuse.

“ _Well_?” Rukia’s still waiting for an answer.

The culprits exchange looks. They know what they must do. Without warning, Haru recovers his weapon and fires at Rukia.

“Catch me if you can, Mom!” he challenges before disappearing up the stairs.

Rukia looks at her husband, shaking her head. She snatches the gun from his hands, and takes off after their son.


	32. Roiyaruraito

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She saved him and he vowed that she wouldn't die.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Roiyaruraito means “royal light" in Japanese.

He breaks a bit more when she kicks his hand away, and Rukia prays, beseeches whomever to help Ichigo know her true intentions. Cruelty isn’t her objective. She simply needs him to live. She attempts to drive love, hatred, and companionship back to where they came from, but her eyes fill with tears. Rukia spares him a glance, heavy and consumed with every useless emotion, and she vows never to forgive him. Stay still. She hopes Ichigo will. She needs him to because one more inch and her brother’s next attack will finish the job. 

A little more of that innocence, she’s chastised but fallen in love with, fritters into the void, and it isn’t that he doesn’t want to move, to charge after her and pretend this night never happened, it’s that he can’t. She leaves him behind to grab a few more handfuls of life, and when she half-turns to burn his dying form in her memory so that she can drown in her own loathing; not close to a fitting punishment for the burdens she’s placed on him, she feels worthless, less than trash. However, he’s rendered speechless as the light of the Senkaimon bathes her, and makes her glow like crown jewels. He will not squander the time she’s loaned him. He will save her.


	33. Chasing Her

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ichigo Kurosaki has been pursuing a murderer. A trail of blood is always left behind but getting leads is like catching rain. He meets Rukia Kuchiki and the truth has shared his bed ever since.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AU. Major character death.

I couldn’t save her. When I met Rukia Kuchiki there were no signs that she was the killer I’d long pursued. Her petite build that could be easily toppled by rough winds, and those eyes of hers that diminished me every morning beneath sunrays, and every evening as we removed troublesome articles of clothing with only the moon for light, gave no indication that she could pull off such horrible crimes. I suppose I simply did not want to see the truth staring back at me. There had been twenty-seven murders in Karakura Town and its outskirts over the course of two years and every trail had gone cold. The victims all had one thing in common. They were former thugs with rap sheets a mile long. Someone terminated them with extreme prejudice and it was my job to find out who.

When you’re on the run, you get sloppy. That was the first lesson I learned at the academy. I was Rukia’s downfall and not in the way I should have been. We were never supposed to be more than a cop and a perp, but destiny wound our existences together with a string so bumpy with knots we had no choice but to begin and end with each other. We could not be undone but by each other.

After a few months of no leads, an anonymous package arrived on my desk. I called in a video enhancement specialist to make out the parties involved in the murder caught on tape, and there was no mistaking her. I still have nightmares about seeing her covered in someone else’s blood. She ran up on a guy, and with a few, quick slashes, left him face down on the cold ground staining the snow. She spared him a momentary glance, and disappeared in a flash.

Even after seeing her, I went home and waited for her, made dinner for us, greeted her with a long kiss, and made love to her by our fireplace. Lying next to Rukia with her lips pressed against me, the pieces began to fit together after so long. The puzzle I couldn’t decipher, even with clues right in front of me, became complete. She never had time to attend my functions outside of work. She never dropped by the precinct so that we could have lunch. She was always busy or on the other side of town. I suppose those weren’t lies after all.

Even so, she was the light that illuminated all of my dark places in brilliant shades of purple. I was enmeshed in everything that was her. I opened up about my mother’s death, and she helped me put an end to blaming myself. She was not just my remedy, but my ailment as well. Who better to make sense of death than the one who bestowed it so mercilessly on others?

They were thugs, she explained it to me the night I met her on the bridge leading out of town. She was just a  _Yakuza_  foot soldier paying off the debt of her deceased sister. My hands trembled uncontrollably. I nearly dropped the envelope of cash I’d decided to give her. I hoped that my emergency fund and meager life savings would afford her a fresh start, but in many ways, I was still just a dumb rookie.

And then came the bright lights and sirens.

“It’s over, Kurosaki,” a uniform said. “Step away from the suspect.”

Before I could think of what to do, Rukia hopped onto my back and held a knife to my neck. The officers froze. I suppose they still retained some loyalty to me and concern for my life. She commanded that I walk and I moved us away from the scene and back to my car.

“Get in and leave this place,” she ordered.

Her voice was low and pregnant with authority. I stammered a protest, but she silenced me with a shout that made me feel the blood pulsing in my veins. I got inside the car. Beads of sweat poured from my forehead, and my hands felt glued to the steering wheel. I watched her unsheathe the sword on her back. The white blade rested against the windowsill as we slept every night. She said it made her feel safe. I never questioned it even though I thought it was absurd.

She weaved and bobbed through the fifteen officers, mortally slashing and beheading a few. Heat gathered inside my eyes before the first tears fell. She’d taken two shots in the back, and stumbled a bit, refusing to fall. She slowly turned around to face the one with the gun before he lost himself and unloaded an entire clip into her.

I pushed out of the car, rushing to her side, confusion and madness nipping at my heels. I noticed the last remaining officer fall to his knees, shell-shocked by what he’d seen and done. I reached for her in seconds, but felt I’d been running for hours. I couldn’t stop replaying the last few months of our whirlwind romance in my mind. She was totally a part of me, and when it mattered the most, I’d failed her. I hated the urgent rise and fall of her chest as she gasped for air, as she clung to me and the final moments of her life.

“Ichigo,” she said, exhausting so much energy on my wretched name. “Truth be told, I never wanted this. I hate myself for dragging you into my mess.”

No. It wasn’t what  _I_ wanted. I wanted her to see what I saw. She was beautiful and regal. I know it wasn’t a lie when I witnessed her kindness towards the elderly, and the neighborhood children. I know she was an angel when she woke me up with her awful singing. I know she was pure when she’d cry during sad movies. She wasn’t her mistakes. I didn’t realize I defiled her with my tears until her voice rattled with a throaty chuckle.

“Stop crying, fool. These past few months have been such a gift. I’m so sorry I was dishonest. I should not have done that to you.  Now, you’re hurting and there’s nothing I can do.”

I felt her words somewhere deep inside me like they were being tattooed to my soul. I begged her to hold on, to just be quiet and live a little bit longer, but like she always did, she sobered me with harsh reality.

“I’m letting go, Ichigo. I’m letting go of all the pain and ugliness, but I’m holding on to you.”

She went still and I held her until they took her away from me.

It’s been five years and I’m finally eligible for parole. I don’t know what’s out there for me on the other side, but it isn’t her. The world has passed me by and I don’t know how to rejoin it.

Rukia once told me I was the man in her heart. I don’t think I’ll ever forget that because she has never stopped being the woman in mine.


	34. Weary

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ichigo is weary without her. His world is watery and submerged. Even the light of the moon has abandoned him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The italicized excerpt of poetry is from Percy Bysshe Shelley’s “To the Moon.”

You changed me. It’s like meeting someone and realizing, after a short time, that the two of you have become best friends. It’s like the warmth of a parent gone too soon in the cold, pelting rain. It’s not knowing your identity and each revelation trying its damnedest to tear you apart. It’s whiplash, a switch turning on or off. Sometimes, it’s all I can do to stay on my feet because it’d be easier to fall dead when we say goodbye. Other times, it’s like electricity, and I’m revived because you’ve returned.

I know I accepted that you chose to stay there, but when you come here, I wish you’d never leave. It’s like waking up with you, going to school together, and sneaking you back into my bedroom. It’s finding your doodles and wanting to burn them because I don’t know if I’ll ever see you again so I should start learning to forget you.

I miss your faith in me. I miss your freedom and how it was so easy for you to discard all of that Kuchiki grooming and  _Shinigami_  protocol. You were yourself when we were together, and you smiled and I swear it was enough for me forever.

I know that I can live without you. I do it every day. Sometimes I laugh and even surprise myself when I genuinely enjoy something again. It’s just that it isn’t you. Nothing is you, but you are everything. I feel you in this house and the shackles of your memory keep me here. You changed me, Rukia. It’s like needing fresh air every night because she suffocates me with expectation, wanting to be more to me than you are. It’s looking up at the sky every night and seeing the moon experience its changes while I suffer the phases of missing you.

If I’m the earth and you’re the sky, I guess that explains why I’m always reaching for you, needing you to pass through me, not just into my shadow, but through me again, piercing me with strength so that I can get through this. But I don’t want a temporary eclipse. We had our share of those. Coming and going. Holding on desperately to hello but floundering farewell.

I want to feel you again,  _Rukia_. I want us again,  _Rukia_.

_Art thou pale for weariness of climbing heaven and gazing on the earth?_

I wonder what the depths of my soul are like these days. I imagine a lunar landscape, my darkness all around your light.


	35. Until the Bitter End

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They have loved each other across space and time, throughout life and death.

She shook like winter lived in her bones. Irrevocable death sank into him, tearing him from her arms and erasing him from their dreams. No one said a word as the blood gurgled at his throat. Ichigo’s fingers burned to grab just a fistful longer with her, an eighty-eighth second chance, but life poured out of him anyway. The air around them vibrated from his waning existence. Too much power and promise were inside of him for a normal passing.

Rukia gripped him like a song on the tip of her tongue, and her fingers whitened as the color drained from her and him. Byakuya thought to approach the lovers as they folded into each other, but his feet felt rooted to the ground. Ashes were in his throat, and stressed, red lines branched off in his eyes. He settled on hanging his head.

“Ru…kia,” Ichigo called out. He weakly turned his head left and right, disoriented.

“I’m right here.” Rukia guided him to her by the point of his chin.

Laughter whistled out of him, and it became harder and harder to breathe. He brought a trembling hand up to her face and the floodgates gave way. She rocked him to the sound of her cries, and he struggled to keep his hand firm against her cheek.

“Do… you think we’ll meet again, Rukia?” he breathed.

She wanted to believe they could outrun destiny or even crush it. It’d been their plaything for years now, bending and curving to their will.

“Because I do,” he continued. “I could do this a thousand times and you still wouldn’t be rid of me.”

The sound of his labored heaving ripped through her.

“You fool. You’re so stubborn.” She kept her voice low, and she wished their onlookers would disappear.

“This isn’t the end, Rukia. For us, it never is.”

His soul withered. The sky glowed. And Rukia cursed herself for doubting him. He’d always been a silly romantic at heart, plagued with feelings that ran as deep as the earth’s core. Even in his dying breaths, she could feel his strength surging past everything screaming in her that this was the end.

“It never is,” she echoed.

A clap of thunder boomed, and veins of lightning covered the sky.


	36. I Guess Not

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I had the wrong girl as usual.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ichiruki from someone else's perspective.

It was supposed to be Orihime.

At least, I thought so when Ichigo gallantly defended the girl’s honor. But no. It was a goddamn  _shinigami_ , and even with that rat, Aizen plotting in the shadows, the thought of it being a  _shinigami_  that left Ichigo enamored and slack-jawed was really fucking annoying to me.

Damn,  _it was supposed to be Orihime._

Since when did that Kuchiki prick have a kid sister? Well, a hundred years had passed so I wasn’t exactly on the up-and-up. She came to our hideout and looked at Ichigo, motionless on the ground, and too many memories twisted her face, but she collected herself like something had almost slipped from her fingers. She listened to Hachi’s instructions and then proceeded to pull Ichigo onto her back. She was all of four feet and nine inches give or take a half-inch, but she calmly and rather gracefully gathered the deadweight of his limbs and lifted him. She barely said anything when I offered to carry him. Just “I got this”, and her face broke apart in a forced smile.

Ok, so maybe it wasn’t supposed to be Orihime because now, Rukia is the still one, flat on her back, and covered in bandages. When she breathed, her chest rattled, and this loser, Ichigo, stood over her like he wanted his life to end if hers did.

I never knew guys could glow but he nearly cracked like a firework when her voice brushed aside the silence in the hospital room. And when he left to fight once more alongside us damned  _shinigami_ , she read him like a book – a tragedy to be exact.

His low energy and humble look painted a picture that she didn’t even need both her eyes to see and I wondered how Ichigo was smart enough to know that she was the one. Most of us waste our lives figuring that out.


	37. Tender Mercies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's been 17 months and Rukia hasn't visited Karakura Town once. At least, that's what Ichigo believes.

Rukia doesn’t believe it. She won’t. If it is her cross to bear, she will fight all of Soul Society for Ichigo. Renji approaches her cautiously, hands up like he’s surrendering, but he’s still talking, still trying to convince her to accept the possibility that Ichigo could turn against them.

_“And what of it?” she considers._

Far be it from the substitute shinigami to become angry after they’ve stabbed him in the back with their surveillance and intentions.

Byakuya had acted strangely before telling her. He seemed anxious, and normally, she’d never question him, but it concerned Ichigo, and she tended to betray what was expected of her any time the boy came up.

The words inched out of him as slow as eternity, and it took every bit of Rukia not to curse her brother.

“And if it’s determined that Ichigo is a threat…?” she asked, knowing the answer, but wanting to see if Byakuya would look her in the eyes and say it.

He didn’t. He showed her his back, and released a tired, jagged breath.

“Then he will be eliminated by any means necessary.”

She often tried, but she’d never achieve Byakuya’s semblance of detachment.

Her thoughts turned to the implications laced in what he said, and then to Ichigo’s family. The Soul Society had a long, ugly definition of “by any means necessary,” and she’d be damned if Ichigo added any more meaning to it. She left without a word, and  _Sode no Shirayuki’s_  voice called out to her racked and weary mind.

_“Do not fear for him, Rukia. Ichigo would not go against you.”_

“This isn’t about me.”

_“For him it is. All this time he has desired only you. Vestiges of your soul still mingle with his so I say this with confidence: he cannot cause you any pain so he would never turn on the Soul Society._

Rukia gnashed her teeth and subdued the threat of tears. Ichigo couldn’t be more of a fool if he tried. It was not his job to worry about her when a death warrant waited in the wings for him. He needed to protect himself if Soul Society made a move. No matter what he’d most likely tell her, she cannot forgive herself for the turmoil he’s endured and the betrayal he’s unaware of.

Renji’s yelling at her now because her attention has drifted elsewhere. She groans, and cuts her eyes at him.

“No way!”

Her voice booms and there is a chill in the air that silences him.

“Ichigo would never –” she breaks. “He would never yield to the enemy’s temptation!”

Renji pulls back. She spares him a final glance, and leaves.

She will make him and everyone else believe what she knows. Ichigo has not changed. The guilt of her refusal to visit him chews at her heart, and  _Sode no Shirayuki’_ s words sour on her lips. She wishes he knows that he’s all she’s wanted, but it’s easier to soldier on like nothing has happened, as if the two of them never felt like one. She tramples old fantasies and dreams underfoot, reminding herself again that none of this is about her.

A promise to Orihime shakes her back.

There must be a way to help Ichigo retrieve his powers.

A  _Senkaimon_  opens and she moves forward, bound for a candy shop inconspicuously nestled in Karakura Town.

She ignores an open window at the Kurosaki home as she alights then ascends from streetlight to streetlight.


	38. What He Believes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ichigo has always believed life was very much one way until it very much isn't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coffee shop AU.

Two spirits float together in the back of Heartwork Café, lingering between this world and whatever makes up the next, and Ichigo turns his attention to the poet at the microphone. She recites something about losing things and he thinks he would have done better just watching the ghosts. 

He has been crazy for years. 

The not-quite-afterlife has revealed its mysteries to him since boyhood, making ghosts thirsty with longing visible to his eyes and no one else’s. The loneliness used to bite with wintry cold, but he’s long accepted what life has chosen to be for him. 

His memory most clearly goes back to six-years-old. He’d always been an organized and tidy child, putting his toys away and smoothing the covers on his bed relentlessly because he adored straight lines. 

After he returned home from the dojo one evening, toys were scattered all over his bedroom. His mother left him behind to answer the cries of his baby sisters. Ichigo closed the door, and once the lock clicked, a frail boy came into view, sitting on the bed and kicking his legs up and down. Ichigo swallowed his next breath and felt his body freeze until he was met with kind eyes. 

“Would you… like someone to play with?”

Ichigo’s parents didn’t have much time for him. It had been a hard two years for Yuzu and Karin after their premature birth, but the sun always rises, and soon, his sisters were no longer in danger of losing their little lives, and his parents gave themselves permission to exhale. 

“Did you have fun with your mom and dad today, Ichigo?” the boy asked.

“Mhm! This time, we went to the park and I got to push my sisters in the stroller. My mama bought me ice cream and I got to ride on Daddy’s shoulders all the way home!” 

The boy smiled and Ichigo realized, as he looked through him, that the clothing on his action figures was too noticeable, his view barely obstructed. 

“Hey, Ichigo,” the boy said, curling his fingers into fists, “thank you for being my friend. I think… I can go now.”

“Go where?” 

Ichigo nearly choked as he watched more and more of him disappear. He did not believe in what he couldn’t see. As much as he wanted to grab more handfuls of time with the boy, hoping was as formless as trying to see wind. 

“To that place. The place you go when you die. I just didn’t want to go alone, but I’m not alone if I take your friendship with me. Since your sisters are better now, you don’t have to be so lonely. It’s time.” 

He faded, and Ichigo cried like the ocean needed to be refilled. Tatsuki said he was insane, making up imaginary friends, but Ichigo had always had an affinity for the very real especially when if it escaped the human eye. 

_Some things are immutable._

* * *

The poet’s prattling is succeeded by the quirky beat of a pop song, and the two ghosts are no longer bored to tears. Ichigo is reminded of that day, when he made a friend who did not walk among the living, a nameless boy that felt more real than all the people around him.

_Maybe it is insane to feel disconnected from what’s right there._

_Sode no Shirayuki_ is covered in ice almost to the ribbon when Rukia slices through a hammer-headed hollow so its blood doesn’t stain her sword and she is grateful. Details of the first two weeks of her mission are told by fresh scars striping across her abdomen. She has never longed for home until now. The Soul Pager still beeps and she cranes her head back, taking in the building where the spirit activity readings emanate. 

“Cof… fee? What could be so sinister about this… coffee to draw in such intense energy? I suppose I won’t know until I go inside.” 

The shop is spacious and alive with color, and full with the smell of _something_ , and Rukia feels crystal clear, awakened. The loud slam of the music makes her skin tingle; electric, melting all of her fatigue. She scans the room, and finds the two spirits that have moved on to the lonely second floor. Her confusion returns. They don’t appear strong enough to be more than a blip on her radar. They’re only pluses, but her first lesson had been to underestimate no one. She climbs the stairs to the second floor to intercept them. 

Ichigo looks up from his cappuccino and he’s stunned by the appearance of a little woman clad in dark robes with a sword at her hip. Everyone else seems preoccupied with their drinks, the music, their lives. He rises practically without willing himself to, and cuts through the thickening crowd, rushing to pursue the woman in black. 

The spirits cower beneath Rukia, holding each other and shutting their eyes to prepare themselves. Her sword sings when she pulls it from its sheathe and Ichigo’s eyes widen. A feeling bubbles in his chest. His ears are on fire. 

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” 

Rukia jerks around at the sound of his voice, shaken. 

“You… can see me?” 

“I asked you a question! What the hell do you think you’re doing to them?” 

The spirits waft behind Ichigo. Rukia looks around to make sure they haven’t become a spectacle, but the darkness covers them. 

“It’s going to be alright,” Ichigo tells the spirits. “Hey, you!”

“ _Bakudo_ Number One! Sai!” 

Ichigo’s arms fly behind his back and he’s compelled to drop to his knees. Rukia flips her sword over and tattoos a symbol to the foreheads of both spirits. They are swept away in a haze of blue light. Ichigo writhes against the restrictions of the binding spell, and Rukia snaps her fingers to release him. His face kisses the wooden floor and his arms feel like they’ve been galled by ropes. 

“What… are you?” 

“I am a _shinigami_. My name is Rukia Kuchiki.”

* * *

When there are no hollows to be cleansed and she is done seeking out spirits to help pass on, Rukia breathes in Colombian roast with Ichigo and tries her hand at art. His still feels his singular comment about her new passion across his head, and he has kept quiet ever since.

“So this place – why do you come here every day?” Rukia blows into her cup now after learning the hard way. Apparently _shinigami_ can be scorched by drinks prepared by the living. Ichigo had figured as much.

“Why do _you_ come here every day?” Ichigo drops a cube of sugar into his café au lait.

“You’re so difficult!”

He has said more than once that she talks too much, but curiosity lingers on her like smoke, and the Living World becomes more than just work through Ichigo’s stories. 

“Yeah, whatever.” 

He droops his head and smiles. Only a little bit.

* * *

The streets vibrate with people’s screams and Ichigo can only help them to safety as Rukia wages an unseeable battle overhead. Skyscrapers rumble and windows crack, sprinkling glass down onto the streets, but the hysteria silences once everyone finds refuge in the surrounding buildings. Ichigo tries to settle his group, passing the goings-on outside as an earthquake. Rukia falls from the sky after colliding with the backhand of a hollow. 

Ichigo’s heart squeezes, and he runs because weeks have passed and he goes to Heartwork looking for more than a good cup of coffee, because he feels peace knowing his old friend actually found that place, because Rukia helps him believe that he isn’t crazy. 

He catches her before she hits the ground. Her sword falls, metal flipping and clanging before settling on the pavement, and Ichigo places Rukia down gently and grabs _Sode no Shirayuki_. He grips the hilt with both hands and drills the hollow with a look that foretells its death. Light envelops him, and Rukia drags her body towards him, gritty concrete stabbing her skin. She finds the strength to pull herself up, pops open her eyes to focus her vision, and she runs to him using the reserves of her strength. 

“Ichigo!” 

She reclaims her sword and pushes him out of the way. The hollow bears down but meets the point of a cold blade. 

“ _San no mai, Shirafune!”_  

The ice disperses, freezing the hollow from the inside out. Its body cracks into uncountable needles of ice. Rukia’s knees buckle and Ichigo is there before she falls again. 

“Don’t ever… do that again, you fool.” 

He learns that people’s memories can be wiped and replaced. Ichigo is unconcerned with the details as Rukia divulges them. Her voice is enough. He smiles more than he has in a long time. It’s nice that she’s still alive.

* * *

“Open it.” 

Ichigo is skeptical, but he removes the top from the plastic tube and slides out the poster inside. On it is what is supposed to be him and Rukia. The hair is the only giveaway. 

“So… you drew us… as bunnies?” 

_“Obviously.”_

He can’t deny the expectant look on her face and he’d be lying if he said he didn’t appreciate it. His apartment is bare so there are many places for Rukia’s masterpiece. Perhaps it’ll fetch thoughtful attention when his friends visit. He hopes so anyway. 

* * *

“Well, this is goodbye, Ichigo.”

The doors of a gate shake open behind her. A black butterfly grazes his shaking right hand. Her mission has concluded. 

“I guess so.” 

She steps into the blinding light, and stops to give him a final look. She’s as breathtaking as she was when he first saw her step inside Heartwork. Maybe even more so since he’s grown used to her. 

“Hey, Rukia –” 

“Hey, Ichigo –” 

Their laughter is nervous, pregnant with the need to articulate the forbidden. She is from that place and he roams Tokyo aimlessly, wasting too much money on cups of coffee. 

“Later, Rukia.” 

“Yeah.” 

The gate closes, and he doesn’t just see ghosts anymore. He believes in them, and _shinigami_ , and swords that slice through souls. He believes in Rukia Kuchiki and he wonders if farewell is truly farewell.

* * *

Ichigo waits for the go-ahead to cross the street. There is an art show and after party at Heartwork. It has been two months since he heard the screech of a hollow or Rukia’s mischievous giggling, but life sweeps him up and busies him.

A child flees the hold of his mother’s hand and runs ahead before the light changes. A car comes barreling towards him, but Ichigo reacts; too many quick reflexes gained from fretting over Rukia’s fights. He pushes the boy forward and the car can’t stop quickly enough and strikes Ichigo. 

It’s too much to hold as his insides bleed. Sweat trickles into his eyes as he tries to breathe. He prays his family won’t worry, but it’s selfish to desire that. He doesn’t think he wants to die. There are many things he thought he’d strike off his list, but he knows that a place exists that confirms that death is not the end. A flat line, a stubborn buzz, and the call of the doctor are the last things he registers when his breath cuts off. 

His chest is heavy and he rubs his fingers across the chain protruding from it. He’s just like all the spirits he befriended and he is not afraid. He leaves the hospital for Heartwork and the patrons on the rooftop look alive in a way he never used to see himself. 

“You’re so predictable!” 

Ichigo touches his lips to stifle his chuckles. 

“I thought I was difficult.” 

“That too.” 

Rukia is leaning against a streetlight with two butterflies flapping around her. She dismisses how hard it is to see him this way, thinking she’s silly for it, but she always knew his need to save everyone would cost too much one day. When he turns around, his delight is unbecoming of a dead man.

“Why are you still here, Ichigo?”

 _To feel what it’s like…_  

 _To smell the coffee again…_  

 _To see you…_  

‘I guess I wanted to experience it for myself’ is all he says. 

She huffs. Yes. Still difficult. 

“It’s time, Ichigo.” 

“I know.”

The _Senkaimon_ opens and the butterflies usher them in, and Ichigo feels power surging inside of him when he takes the first step. It’s almost overwhelming, almost scary, but Rukia returns her favors. She will not let him fall.

 

 


End file.
